The Wanderer
by Master Bombadil
Summary: When Sirius fell through the Veil, Harry's world came crashing down now, he has set out on the most amazing journey he has ever imagined. And he's not the only one... AU after OotP, time travel, no slash.
1. Prologue

A/N: This is my first fanfic, and it's been floating around in my head for ages, but I can never decide how to do the first chapter. Hopefully I've managed it now, with the help of a couple of blinding flashes of insight.

Disclaimer: JKR really did write the HP series, it wasn't Martians in disguise.

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Prologue

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1996

Harry's summer activities had always been rather unusual: everything from escaping from his relatives in a flying car to fighting Dementors sent after him by the government.

But this topped them all.

Stealing records from the Department of Mysteries.

With a little planning, it wasn't too hard: he had sneaked past the Order guards at Privet Drive under his invisibility cloak, summoned the Knight Bus, gone to Diagon Alley where the Ministry couldn't trace the several anti-detection charms he had then cast on himself, walked two miles to the Ministry building, entered through the visitor entrance and followed the route he had taken two weeks ago. Knowing it was probable that there were wards placed on the records similar to the ones that had put Broderic Bode in St. Mungo's, Harry had used an assortment of muggle tools to avoid touching anything or setting off magic detectors.

As he read through the information on the Veil, it soon became apparent that Dumbledore had not told him the truth, and why. The Veil's actual name was the _Carcer Negra, _or Black Prison; it was made by an ancient Dark Lord and led to a magical space in which inmates were subjected to pain similar to the Cruciatus Curse and psychological torture similar to the effects of a Dementor, while at the same time being healed and nourished so that their minds remained intact and they did not die until they fell to old age. But the good news was that they could be gotten out; the rest of the bad news was that only a Dark Lord could get them out.

So Harry then replaced the records of the Veil and located the ones on Dark Lordship. According to the file, no one knew the origins of the Dark Lordship, but it could only be held by one wizard at a time and it increased the effects of any dark magic they used, and there were several artifacts designed for use by the Dark Lord, including the Veil. To become a dark lord, you had to kill the current one, and then you would be offered a choice of whether or not to accept Dark Lordship; if you refused it would then be offered to the wizard with the most raw power, and then the second, and so on. Dumbledore would have been offered it when he defeated Grindelwald, but he had obviously refused it, so it would have been offered to Tom Riddle.

As Harry left the Department of Mysteries, he vowed that he would get Sirius back, and it didn't matter how he did it.

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1996

7:00 AM

Harry set _Ritual Magic_ by Salazar Slytherin down as he reviewed the incantations for The Leaping for the tenth time. So far the book had been nothing but a string of surprises, and he really didn't want any while working a particularly dangerous (and stupid, a voice in the back of his head told him) ritual.

That Hermione had sent him a book containing extremely dark magic had been the least of the surprises; she thought that it would be good for him to study the rituals that Voldemort had likely used, to gain an idea of his strengths and weaknesses. That was all well and good (if rather unpleasant), but the animated snake on the cover was convinced that he was Salazar Slytherin, having apparently not realized that he wasn't the only parselmouth to have ever lived. Then when he'd actually gotten as far as opening the cover, Harry had seen Slytherin's handwriting; it was strangely familiar, as if he should have known who it was. It certainly wasn't like Voldemort's, or anyone else Harry could think of, but it really irked him that he couldn't place it.

Then Slytherin had dropped a bombshell on him with the first page; the Founding Snake had written that many rituals were 'black magic' and 'should only be studied for the advancement of knowledge, I myself have avoided using them and advise the reader to do so as well.' After further reading Harry had decided that 'white' was probably broader than 'light' and 'black' a little narrower than 'dark'; but it was still a shock to see one of the most famous dark wizards in history advising against dark magic.

Most of the white rituals dealt with increasing the caster's physical abilities, though there were several others such as the animagus transformation and one that would allow the caster to convert their magic into a specific element; although Slytherin said that it was impossible to increase your raw magical power. A quick glance at the black rituals (nearly all of which dealt with achieving immortality) had told Harry that he didn't want to even read any of them: most of them dealt with torture, rape, murder or sacrificing bits of your soul.

So far Harry had completed a strength enhancing ritual (his muscles didn't look any bigger, but he'd been quite pleased with the increase in strength) and the Animagus Transformation (his form was a displacer beast, a panther-like creature with human intelligence and the ability to turn invisible). The ritual Harry was about to perform was a particularly dangerous white ritual known as The Leaping; Slytherin had advised against it because of its danger but admitted to performing it himself. Harry was definitely going to find out more about Slytherin when he got the chance…

The Leaping could be cast up to seven times, and sent the caster to another time, but not into the future. Harry's plan was to travel into the past to train so he would be able to catch up with Voldemort and possibly become a dark lord himself, and so that Sirius did not have to suffer while he prepared to free him from the _Carcer Negra._

Hopefully he wouldn't be ripped to pieces and scattered across several decades…

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A/N: So, did I torture you by waiting so long to post or did I torture you by posting at all? I should have the next chapter up soon, it's mostly written.


	2. Chapter 1: Genesis

A/N: Harry is going to be using an alias in this fic, and I'll refer to him by it to avoid confusion.

I'll be responding to reviews that I think need responding, but not all, because I really hate it when you have to scroll through three pages of author's notes and review responses.

Mystical Witch: I've changed my answer and decided that Dumbledore really did think Sirius was dead.

Disclaimer: I have not bought the rights to Harry Potter in the twenty-four hours since I last posted.

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Chapter 1: Genesis

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1975

Harry had no sense of anything other than himself, his clothes and his backpack, except for the vague feeling of moving in some direction; everything around him was a shapeless void. Harry looked at his watch, waiting for the timer to reach the one minute mark.

0:57…0:58…0:59…1:00.

_Tempus normallo!_

And Harry was standing in the smallest bedroom of number four Privet Drive, just like that. He couldn't feel the landing at all, but the suddenness of the rooms' appearance startled him and he jumped at least a foot, then made a very audible thump as he came back down, loaded as he was with his backpack; somehow it hadn't occurred to him until just now that he wouldn't want to be seen in the house in whatever time he'd landed in.

Footsteps were coming down the hall, no doubt attracted by the noise, and Harry reached into the pack and pulled out his invisibility cloak (which he'd put on top) and threw it over himself as just as a middle aged woman opened the door. She looked around for only a moment before leaving.

Letting out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, Harry left and made his way downstairs only to find the father of the family enjoying a weekend with two young children, and it ended up being over two hours before he was able to escape without anyone noticing a door opening. Still, Harry was feeling quite pleased with himself as he left: he had traveled through time and escaped the Dursleys, Voldemort, the Ministry and Dumbledore all at once, and with his invisibility cloak, the Marauders' Map and a million pounds that he'd gotten changed at Gringotts during one of his trips to get items for a ritual.

Harry ducked into the first alley he came to and took off his invisibility cloak, then made his way to a bus stop he knew to be nearby and got off at a mall in downtown Surrey. After obtaining contact lenses at an eye care store and buying some concealer, Harry went into the bathroom and tried casting color changing charms on them, and, with several minutes' work, got them to change his eye color to blue. With a thought, he turned his hair blond and lengthened it until it reached his shoulders; a useful skill he'd discovered one night while trying to distract himself from his most recent nightmare (about Voldemort entering the _Carcer Negra_ to torture Sirius even more than he already was being tortured) by attempting to change his appearance like Tonks. He'd only been able to change his hair, but a book he'd gotten on the same trip as the muggle money had revealed that he was a hirumagus, a wizard who was able to wandlessly transfigure his hair; apparently it worked differently from the Metamorphmagus ability and enabled him to turn his hair into just about anything with enough practice. Taking out the concealer, Harry carefully covered his scar with it until he was sure no one could see it and secured it with sticking and preservation charms. Harry was counting on some of the other rituals in Slytherin's book to change the rest of his appearance before school started; he just hoped he didn't end up looking like Voldemort.

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1975

11:30 AM

Harry (now calling himself Mordecai Saunders) stepped out of Ollivander's, makers of fine wands. Said wand shop didn't have anything suited for him, except the wand he would buy in the future, but he obviously couldn't take that one; so when Mr. Ollivander had been in the back, Mordecai had transformed and contrived to remove some of his fur, which Mr. Ollivander agreed to make into a wand that would hopefully suit Mordecai better than the others. He said he was going to close the store for the day because he was so excited to be able to make a wand with a displacer beast's fur, and that Mordecai could pick it up in the afternoon.

Mordecai made his way toward the entrance to Knockturn Alley, as he expected he would be able to find more information on Occlumency and Legilimency there than in Diagon Alley. The place did indeed look quite dark: there were hags hawking everything from newt eyes to shriveled fingers, bookshops with titles such as _Dark Arts Mastery: The Road to Power_ by T. M. Riddle on display, and Borgin and Burkes had what was private merchandise in Harry's time out front. Mordecai supposed that Voldemort openly challenging the Ministry was making them bolder; a calendar in the window of one store told him it was 1975.

After a moments' thought, Mordecai decided he'd visit the snake shop before the mind magic bookstore: it would be a lot more interesting. On entering, Mordecai found the shop close and packed; cages with snakes of all kinds and colors were stacked to the ceiling in groups on the floor with narrow aisles between, and the shelves along all the walls were crammed with assorted snake care products, snake parts useful for potions and a large number of dark items often used in conjunction with snakes.

Squeezing past a hag and nearly knocking a small, goblin-like man over, Mordecai make his way to the nearest cage, which housed a snake that was about five feet long and jet black. The sign overhead read 'Argentine Purple Jagger.'

_"Hello,"_ Mordecai hissed.

The snake stirred and looked at him, _"Did you sspeak to me?"_

_"Yess."_

The snake mulled that over for a moment and said, _"I didn't know humanss could."_

_"Very few can."_

_"What iss thiss place?"_

Mordecai found it extremely awkward to explain to a creature that it was being held in a cage until someone bought it for their amusement, but he managed somehow.

The snake took it surprisingly well, commenting that humans were odd predators, 'hunting' their 'prey' with 'money' and then not bothering to eat it. After an awkward pause, Mordecai asked the snake if it wanted to come with him and it eagerly accepted.

After a stop across the street Mordecai ducked into an alley to shrink the books he had bought on occlumency and legilimency, put them in his pocket and headed toward Diagon Alley with the intention of having an ice cream at Florean Fortescue's, but another shop caught his eye. The sign overhead read simply _Wand Improvements._

The store was squeezed between two others and recessed slightly, with a narrow, dingy opening, as if the builder had tried to make it inconspicuous, but looked quite busy anyway. Entering the crowded shop, Mordecai made his way to the long counter at the back and asked what the improvements were and the woman behind the counter shoved a catalog at him without even looking up from her magazine.

Flipping through, Mordecai saw that the shop mostly offered cosmetic and durability improvements, though they also had a wide variety of more useful and expensive upgrades that were listed under _Discrete Services._ It was these that interested him, as he didn't really care about appearances that much and figured he would be able to add strengthening charms himself.

On returning to the counter and being helped by a girl of about his age, Mordecai asked to have a discharge stone added to his wand (which would charge itself by taking a little energy from every spell he cast, and then could be used to boost spells) and to have it bonded to a ring (allowing it him to transfigure it into the ring and back with a thought).

The girl asked what sort of animal he would like to hold the discharge stone, Mordecai told her a winged cat and she walked off to consult with an older man. There was something oddly familiar about her that he simply couldn't place; maybe one of her future children went to Hogwarts…

She returned with what looked like a miniature animated stuffed winged cat and coaxed it to fly onto his wand, then drew her own and transfigured it into holly wood, so that it was perched in front of the handle. With a little more transfiguration and charm work the legs had disappeared so that it looked as if it were emerging from the wand, wings extended and ready to fly down its length, jaws open to receive the stone.

Unfortunately, the shop did not have a discharge stone suited to Mordecai or his wand, though he was able to have it treated with a potion that would increase the effectiveness of some spells at the expense of others; Mordecai chose to sacrifice any capability with the Dark Magic in exchange for enhanced shield spells.

Mordecai then went over to a display case and chose a ring to bond his wand to, and brought it over to the girl, whom he still couldn't place.

On his way out, Mordecai examined the ring on his left finger: it was a plain gold band most of the way around, with a large, flat ruby partially covered with finely crafted gold leaf over the center in the shape of a (roaring?) cat, the ruby showing through in places as if the cat had red and gold fur.

As he entered Diagon Alley, Mordecai began to think about what sort of cover story he would need if he was going to attend Hogwarts. He'd have to say he was home schooled, as no wizard institution would have records of him, and that his parents and any records of his education had suddenly disappeared. Maybe a Death Eater attack? It would be close enough to true, and Mordecai didn't want to have to keep up with too many lies, or he might slip and say something wrong.

While he had been thinking, Mordecai had gotten an ice cream at Florean Fortesque's, and now he realized that none of the tables were open. Looking around, he saw his mother sitting alone at a table and made his way over with absolutely no idea what he was going to say. He'd often dreamed or about what he'd say if ever got to talk to his parents, but it had never occurred to him that they wouldn't know him from Salazar Slytherin and he wouldn't be able to discuss anything that happened after 1975.

"Hello?" Lily asked, and Mordecai realized he'd been standing in front of her for nearly a minute.

"Can I sit here? Everywhere else is full." Now he was blushing in embarrassment and looked like some stricken teen asking his first crush out. Wonderful.

"Okay," Lily said, a little warily.

"Sorry. I'm a bit out of it today," Mordecai supplied, eager to give Lily an explanation other than the stricken admirer scenario. It probably happened to her quite a bit, as she was very attractive.

After a moment of awkward silence, he took to watching the people wandering Diagon Alley, some glancing about nervously and hurrying to return to the safety of their homes, others defiantly taking their time and walking down the middle of the street. It was a group of the latter that finally caught his attention.

James Potter was strutting through Diagon Alley telling a joke to Sirius Black and Remus Lupin. They looked very different from what Harry remembered: Remus didn't have the premature wrinkles and worn appearance of his future self, Sirius' eyes no longer held the haunted look of Azkaban that had never quite left them, and James… was real. A quick check revealed that Pettigrew was not with them, which was good, since Mordecai somehow didn't want his first meeting with his parents to involve murder.

Lily was feeling a little less nostalgic. "Not _him_ again! Can't he just leave me alone during the summer?"

At Mordecai's confused glance she explained, "He's an arrogant prat who goes to my school, and he's got this ridiculous crush on me. You don't go to Hogwarts, do you?"

"No, I was homeschooled."

"Was?"

"Voldemort."

"Oh, that's horrible. I'm sorry."

If it hadn't been such a serious topic, Mordecai might have found it funny that his mother was sorry to hear about her own death. As it was he just wanted to change the subject, "I think I'll go to Hogwarts this year."

"I'm sure you'll like it, Hogwarts is really great, even with Potter around. What year will you be in?"

"Sixth."

"Me too. You can borrow my booklist if you like, as you might not be able to read all the textbooks before September if you wait."

"Thanks," Mordecai said, smiling; Lily was starting to remind him of Hermione.

Unfortunately, James spotted Lily before he had gotten in line. After giving their orders to Remus, James and Sirius made a beeline for her.

After rumpling his hair a little extra, James asked, "Having a good summer, Evans?"

"Alright, until you showed up." If Lily was starting sixth year, that meant the scene he had seen in Snape's pensieve had happened fairly recently, and Lily had been a bit peeved with James afterwards.

"I don't remember seeing you at Hogwarts," James said, pretending he hadn't heard.

"I was home schooled, but I'll be going to Hogwarts this year."

"Oh. I hope you're in Gryffindor, and if do anything to Evans, I'll kill you."

"Is that how you usually greet people?"

"Pretty much," Remus said, returning with the Marauders' ice creams.

James spared a moment to glare at Remus before pulling a chair over to Mordecai and Lily's table.

"Thanks," Lily said coldly, propping her feet on the chair before James had a chance to sit in it. Since the table was against the wall there wasn't any more space for another chair, so the Marauders took a table next to Lily's as it opened up.

"Have you heard anything about Voldemort? (Lily, Remus and Sirius flinched) I haven't been paying any attention to the news lately."

"You'd have to be living in a cave to not hear the latest about Voldemort." James had put a slight emphasis on 'Voldemort,' as if to announce that he wasn't afraid to say his name.

"I've been grieving…he killed my parents."

"I'm sorry," James said, "I shouldn't have said that."

After an uncomfortable pause, Lily gave him a run-down on Voldemort: "He's only been attacking once a month for the last four months, and not against anyone important. It's like he's barely hanging on and is trying to remind people he's still dangerous."

Mordecai doubted that, given the descriptions he'd heard from Sirius of the first war, and James thought so as well, "I doubt that; if the Ministry had had any big successes they would've announced it. He's probably busy with something else."

"Like looking for something," Mordecai thought aloud. In his first five years at Hogwarts the things Voldemort had looked for included a stone that would give him is body, immortality as long as he kept it and nearly unlimited wealth; Ginny's life and the closure of Hogwarts in exchange for his body; Harry's blood, to get his body back and give him Lily's protection; and a prophecy that would enable him to figure out how to kill Harry. All in all, Voldemort looking for something was generally bad. "Maybe something to help him in trying to become immortal," all of the above items had been for that purpose (the last indirectly through increasing his chances at killing Harry), it would make sense that whatever he was looking for now would be too.

"What do you mean? Do you know something about him?"

"I saw him at a distance," oddly enough, it was a lie: Harry had seen Voldemort plenty of times, but it had always been up close and personal, "the only way his appearance could be as deformed as it is is through the extremely dark rituals required for immortality."

After about five seconds of complete silence from everyone else, Mordecai got the idea that he had said something wrong.

"You've studied _ritual magic?"_

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1975

Why _did I have to put my foot in my mouth like that?_ Mordecai thought miserably as he walked down Diagon Alley, viciously kicking any stone unlucky enough to be in his path. James had threatened his life if he ever even looked at Lily again, Sirius was certain he would be 'the slimiest Slytherin since Salazar himself,' Lily had run off crying that she could never make any friends without James ruining everything, and, to top it all off, he hadn't had time to get the booklist from her. Mordecai tried to reassure himself by reminding himself that the only things James knew about ritual magic were that Dark Lords used it and it was highly illegal, but that just wasn't very helpful.

And the snake, which he still hadn't named yet, was incredibly curious about human interaction and couldn't stop pestering him.

Spotting a good distraction, Mordecai made his way to a temporary booth with a sign above it that encouraged people to 'join the aurors today and change the world,' here, again, people divided into two distinct groups: the more numerous crossed to the opposite side of the street and stayed as far from the booth as possible, as if to say they weren't fighting and would Voldemort please leave them alone; the smaller group passed nearby and exchanged greetings (they seemed much friendlier) or the absence of news about Voldemort.

Reaching the recruiting stand, Mordecai picked up a brochure and saw that anyone with a N.E.W.T. in defense and a second in either charms or transfiguration could sign up for training; they obviously weren't being picky.

An auror behind the booth was explaining the use of a potion he was holding up to several others nearby, "–so if you can't drink any without getting a headache you're a squib, 2 or 3 drops is average, and Dumbledore can drink seven, which is the highest possible."

"What about Voldemort?" Mordecai asked.

Everyone in hearing distance, including the aurors behind the booth, flinched. After moments pause, the auror who had been speaking said, "He doesn't exactly make a habit of visiting the Ministry to give us information, does he?"

"I suppose not," Mordecai admitted, wondering if Madam Pomphrey could cure foot-in-mouth disease, "Could you test me?"

"Alright," the auror said, conjuring a glass and adding a drop of the potion he was holding to it. Those nearby moved closer to get a better look, Mordecai Saunders seemed to have the same natural talent for attracting attention as Harry Potter.

As he drained the first glass and felt nothing, Mordecai thought, _Malfoy can't call me a squib now._

A second glass, no headache._ The Boy-Who-Lived is at least average._

A third glass, no headache. _Of course, Snape will just think it's a fake potion._

A fourth glass, no headache. Mordecai vaguely wondered where he'd be on one of those curves muggles plot people's test scores on.

A fifth glass, no headache. _Maybe now–_

A sixth glass, no headache. _–I've got a chance–_

A seventh glass, no headache._ –at beating him._

An eighth glass, and Mordecai clapped his hands to his head as a painful throbbing filled it.

Mordecai mumbled his thanks and stumbled off not noticing the looks he was receiving from his audience. Another auror informed him that headache potions wouldn't help this particular headache, and Mordecai grumbled something indistinct before heading back up the alley. He'd had a couple more things he'd intended to do this afternoon, but right now he was just going to get a room at the Leaky Cauldron and try to sleep.


	3. Chapter 2: Preparations

Shadowed Rains: Harry isn't a Slytherin reincarnate, but five points for spotting the money thing.

Disclaimer: If you are reading HP fanfiction, you really should have figured out by now that Rowling is the author.

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Chapter 2: Preparations

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1975

Moaning and opening his eyes, Mordecai looked at the room around him in confusion, trying to figure out how he'd gotten there. After several moments memories of yesterday began to filter through his slowly awakening mind.

Something about auror recruiting…

He'd had his power tested…

He'd found out that he was about as powerful as Dumbledore…

And he'd gotten a room at the Leaky Cauldron…

It made sense that he would be powerful, since he'd beaten Voldemort during _Priori Incantatem,_ but he'd thought that it had been a contest of wills at the time, and maybe it was.

Pity he didn't know any curses that could use his power; the power in most spells couldn't be adjusted, only charms, so it wouldn't make any difference how powerful he was until he learned some stronger spells.

Learning meant he'd need to enroll at Hogwarts…

He'd need to complete several more rituals to finish his disguise, and learn occlumency before someone like Dumbledore found out he was from the future.

They probably wouldn't take it too well, and be all worried about changing the past or something ridiculous like that; the timeline Mordecai was from would be a result of his actions in the past, so doing them wouldn't change anything, since they'd happened in the first place, if that made any since. Mordecai hadn't known he was that smart, maybe he'd learned from the incident with the time turner in his third year.

_"Awake?"_ hissed a voice from somewhere around his abdomen. Looking down Mordecai saw the snake he'd gotten yesterday and still hadn't named coiled up next to him; or maybe the snake already had a name.

_"Yeah. Do ssnakess usse namess?"_

_"Yess, mine iss Khelavasster."_

_"I'm Harry Potter, but I'm ussing the name Mordecai Ssaunderss becausse I don't want anyone to know who I am."_

_"Why do you not want anyone to know who you are?"_

_"It'ss…er…complicated…. Do you need to hunt? I have ssome thingss I need to do thiss morning, I'll try to explain it in the afternoon."_

_"Alright," _Khelavaster agreed. Mordecai dragged himself out of bed to open the door and let the snake out, briefly wondering what sort of prey a snake that was less than one inch in diameter would eat.

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1975

After a shower and a breakfast at the Leaky Cauldron, Mordecai picked up his new wand at Ollivanders' (eleven inches of the finest yew that brought out the best properties of it's displacer beast fur core, according to Ollivander) and headed for Gringotts. As he entered the massive white marble edifice, Mordecai couldn't help but notice that there were a lot more goblins guarding the place than he remembered.

After telling a goblin at the counter that he wanted to open an account and change some money (he'd been getting funny looks in Knockturn Alley when he paid for things with muggle money, but no one was going to refuse money, muggle or not), the teller led him through one of the many doors in the main room, through several twisted corridors and into an office with the name Bolgok on the door. The office looked rather strange, as all the furniture except for two chairs in front of a desk were sized for goblins, but the room itself was made to accommodate humans.

"Have a seat," Bolgok invited, before sitting down behind the desk.

As soon as he was sitting, the goblin launched into an explanation of Gringotts accounts without waiting for introductions. "Gringotts accounts are more secure than even the Department of Mysteries (Mordecai didn't have any trouble believing that) and can be accessed at any time, for any reason, despite legal status. We–"

"Hold on," Mordecai questioned, "legal status?"

"We goblins are not under your Ministry and not subject to your laws. Your accounts will be secure and accessible here, no matter the circumstances."

"Good," that explained how Sirius had bought a Firebolt while on the run.

The goblin raised an eyebrow slightly but carried on as if nothing had happened, "We also offer vaults in which you can store items, with 22,620 cubic feet of storage space, and a small maintenance fee of five galleons per month. With either account, a monthly statement will be sent to you listing the contents of your vault and any transactions in the past month."

Mordecai would have to ask Dumbledore what had happened to that monthly statement…

"I don't suppose you give interest?"

"No, because we do not take your money as soon as you leave and start buying things with it," Bolgok said in a tone that suggested he highly disapproved of such practices, though Mordecai was sure there was more to it than just buying things, as he couldn't see how that would give muggle banks extra money for interest.

"Alright. I'll take a storage vault."

"Excellent. Just sign this form."

Mordecai picked up the form Bolgok handed to him and read through it; it said Gringotts would do everything Bolgok said it would, just in extra fancy language.

Back in the main room, Mordecai changed 5,000 pounds and gave Bolgok 300,000 to open his account, and Bolgok gave him his key and informed him that 60,000 galleons would be placed in his vault, but could be exchanged for muggle money whenever he withdrew it. Whatever Bolgok thought of muggle banking practices, Mordecai was going to put most of his money in an account that earned interest.

As Mordecai made his way toward Madam Malkins', he couldn't help but be pleased with his latest idea. Ever since the Department of Mysteries, he'd been trying to think things through more, and had come up with some good ideas.

Pushing open the door, Mordecai made his way to the counter and told a lady there he would like some custom clothes.

"I'll take your measurements and you can order then out of a catalog. Just follow me to the fitting rooms."

"I don't think what I want will be in a catalog," Mordecai said, following.

"I assure you, we have the most comprehensive selection anywhere in Britain; this is Madam Malkins' Robes for _all_ Occasions, after all." She sounded slightly offended.

"I have an invisibility cloak, and would like it made into a robe, gloves, and boot covers." That got her attention.

"Excuse me?"

"I have an invisibility cloak, and would like it made into a robe, gloves, and boot covers."

"I'll see what I can do; it is a rather unusual request."

As it turned out, she was able to make the invisibility robes, but told him he wouldn't be able to use a wand while wearing the gloves, as the magic passing through the fabric would destroy the invisibility charms. He negotiated a price of 500 galleons, but was pretty sure he'd been ripped off.

Mordecai wore the robes out of the shop, as they only turned invisible when he pulled up the hood, and the feel of the watery gray fabric against his skin was extremely comfortable. After a stop for lunch, Mirdecai made his way down Diagon Alley looking for a shop that wasn't open in his time, and might have already been closed.

After several minutes of walking Mordecai spotted Ali Bashir's Cross-Continental Comfort Carpets and made a beeline for it. The windows were so full of carpets that you couldn't see inside until you stepped in, and when Mordecai did, he was stunned at the size of the place: the floor space was similar to that of a muggle department store, but the ceiling was at least as high as that of the great hall at Hogwarts, and several people could be seen testing carpets out in the ample space. The building was definitely bigger on the inside than on the outside.

Every inch of wall and floor was covered in oriental carpet, though, thankfully, the only ones that seemed to be able to fly were the ones on display racks, with pillars near each of them holding books that no doubt contained information on them; it was similar to a car dealership.

"Getting your first carpet today, sir?"

As Mordecai turned to look at the salesman dressed in perfectly cut black robes–most likely the magical equivalent of a business suit–he was reminded even more strongly of a car dealership.

"Yes. Something nearly indestructible."

"Planning on some adventurous flying?" the salesman asked, leading the way to what Mordecai guessed was another section of the store, though he didn't know enough about carpets to know, as they'd been banned by the Ministry by his time.

"Yeah," he hadn't been, actually, but it sounded like a lot of fun, "show me the strongest you've got. Cost is not an issue."

"Over here we have the Titan 5. The base is armored with shock absorbent aluminum honeycomb sandwiched between multiple layers of hi-strength carbon mesh and covered on bottom with dragon-hide treated for optimal spell resistance, and the whole assembly is buried under strength and shield charms. These have been known to take multiple hits from killing curses without significant damage."

"Wow." The carpet Mordecai had been led to certainly looked that sturdy: it sat on top of a four-inch-thick slab of armor, covered in dragon-hide. When Mordecai pushed it, it didn't give at all, like dragon-hide normally did.

"There's also a climate control field that controls temperature and blocks fog, rain, snow, sleet, hail, lightning, high winds or anything else you don't want, and allows you to fly at high altitudes with little air. Maximum airspeed is 94 m.p.h. and acceleration isn't very good, but it can transport up to 20,000 pounds."

Mordecai was quite impressed, and it would be perfect for his plans.

"I'll take four."

The salesman couldn't quite keep the surprise off his face as he said, "I'm afraid that's going to be 40,000 galleons," though he didn't look very afraid, but more like a salesman who was going to get a very large commission.

Mordecai bargained the salesman down to 35,000 before making the purchase (the salesman wouldn't let him test it in the store, since it was against company policy to let underage wizards fly carpets inside), signing a money order and arranging for the carpets to be delivered directly to his Gringotts vault.

Mordecai felt extremely pleased with himself as he made his way back to the Leaky Cauldron, completely oblivious of the snake laying in wait to ambush him with questions…


	4. Chapter 3: I travel through time

A/N: Sorry about the wait, but it's longer than the last chapter, so please don't send any death threats. Actually I'd be thrilled to find that someone liked my story that much…

I will be updating chapters whenever I find any grammatical mistakes, etc, but will tell you in a note if I make any important changes.

Shadowed Rains: Thanks for telling about the reviews, I've fixed that now.

Thoth Father of Magic: I'll be in VA for a week, so don't hold your breath on updates, though I'm going to have a lot of time to plan the next part out. And I'm not trying that hard to get Matt to read it. (I do have a brain.)

Disclaimer: When the books say that the author is R-o-w-l-i-n-g, they mean 'Rowling,' not 'Master Bombadil.'

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Chapter 3: I travel through time and still can't ride a train without meeting a Malfoy

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1975

Mordecai groaned, wishing he hadn't woken up. Khelavaster had kept him up until after 1, and he'd had a busy day.

Realizing he wouldn't be going back to sleep, as it was almost 8, Mordecai summoned _Dueling with Minds_ by James Sultzey, because he didn't want to have to get up yet (the Ministry couldn't detect who was doing magic or how old they were, so he was safe as long as he stayed in areas where there were adult wizards doing magic). The introduction was nearly Snape-like, with Sultzey informing the reader that if they couldn't do all of the exercises in his book after the second reading, they were either lazy or mentally retarded.

After saying this, Sultzey devoted an entire chapter to the complexity of the mind. He described three layers of the mind: physical, which was what controlled muscle movement and all bodily functions; sensory, which processed information, experienced emotions and governed reflexive actions or thoughts; and rational, which was where thought took place. The physical layer didn't matter in occlumency or legilimency, since no legilimens had ever been able to detect it. Occlumency and legilimency relied on the link formed between minds when they sensed each other and their sensory layers connected, through which their rational layers could battle.

As he read, Mordecai found there was more to 'the most basic and rudimentary methods of occlumency ever devised' than trying not to think of anything: you were to focus on a single thing and use it to clear all other thoughts from your sensory layer, thus preventing a link from forming so that a battle could not even begin. You could focus on nearly anything, though each wizard usually had one or two things that worked best for them. What you focused on made a difference: a legilimens who focused on water would have a much easier time defeating an occlumens who used fire than one that used stone walls; these differences could be overcome, though, and Sultzey referenced a wizard he had met once who constructed his defenses with amazingly fire-resistant wool socks (Mordecai was pretty sure that had been Dumbledore).

After studying for another hour, Mordecai got up and dressed in the one set of clothes he had brought with him, deciding as he did so that he needed to buy some more.

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1975

Mordecai glared at the interrogators in front of him.

All he'd done was walk into a muggle bank and announce that he wanted to open an account with nearly 700,000 pounds of cash. Then they'd called security and accused him of being a drug dealer, and he'd been detained for, as near as he could tell, a complete lack of a paper trail.

"You've got no evidence, no charges and no business arresting me!"

"You've been behaving very suspiciously, and it _is_ our business to investigate suspicious behavior."

"You've tested me for drug usage, you've run background checks on me and you've had dogs sniff me and my money and none of _that's_ been suspicious. And whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty, huh?"

"We'll do our job and you'll answer our questions. What do you know about–"

"I've been answering your questions for three hours!"

"You haven't been answering honestly. If you'll just–"

"I have been! It's not like this is some test where you have the answer key; though I'll bet you'll get a nice bonus if you can lock up a 'drug dealer.'" Mordecai knew it was uncalled for, but being arrested and interrogated like this had been uncalled for, too.

Apparently he had touched a nerve, as both interrogators clenched their jaws and one bit out, "You will _shut up_ and _do what you're told._ What do you know of–"

Mordecai tuned the rest out as he relaxed himself, feeling the sensations of flight envelope him, the swooping in his stomach as he soared into the air on his Firebolt, the wind through his hair, the sting on his face…

Mordecai pushed his mind outward, trying to imagine the magical energies swirling about him, though the fact that absolutely nothing was happening didn't help.

"Mr. Saunders? Mr. Saunders!"

Mordecai pelt a prickling at the edges of his senses and pushed toward it. He felt his senses latch onto it; a voice was speaking.

_Why won't the kid answer?_

Other messages flickered though his awareness, some short and half-formed glimpses that were gone almost before they formed, others nearly articulate, but not quite. It was several moments before Mordecai realized they were thoughts.

_He's so stuck up he won't even answer questions. Kids these days…_

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't think of me as 'stuck up.'"

A surprised yelp answered Mordecai, and it was a few moments before the shocked officer could think strait.

_Did he just–_

"Yes."

_That's impossi–_

"No, it isn't."

The first officer was staring at Mordecai in fear and the second was looking between the two trying to figure out what was going on, _What in the blue blazes is–_

"It's not in the blue blazes, it's down here."

Both officers were now staring at him in astonishment and something approaching terror; it was time for a convincing lie…

"If this goes on any more, I'm going to have to wipe your memories and get on with my assignment." Not fifteen minutes later, Mordecai walked out of the bank after a successful transaction, wondering if Salazar Slytherin sacrificing muggles on a blood-soaked altar in Trafalgar Square could have attracted more attention.

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1975

For the rest of the summer, Mordecai studied occlumency and legilimency, practicing the legilimency on muggles, since he didn't want to risk meeting an occlumens. This lead to some interesting revelations, including that 14 of the national transportation budget was spent on luxury cruises and that the Pentagon had somehow obtained a stone that had survived every nuclear test by the United Stated since 1963. Mordecai had wondered if he should tell the Ministry about the last bit, but decided they were probably busy enough as it was.

When he wasn't invading the minds of unsuspecting muggles (he rationalized this by telling himself it didn't matter since he'd probably never see any of them again), Mordecai studied transfiguration. He'd gained a thorough understanding of what he'd spent the last five years learning, gotten partway through _An Advanced Guide to Transfiguration,_ begun practicing transfiguring his hair into different things, and was well on his way to carrying out his latest plan…

Mordecai hadn't had any trouble getting into Hogwarts, he'd just sent a letter to Dumbledore telling him his parents had home schooled him but had been killed, and he'd gotten a letter back telling him that, even though he hadn't been able to take his O.W.L.s, he could sign up for any courses he thought he would be able to take (this was the man that had hired _Snape,_ after all). Wishing his O.W.L. scores had arrived sooner, Mordecai had signed up for DADA, Transfiguration, Charms, Care of Magical Creatures and Potions (he'd actually enjoyed brewing potions during his O.W.L.s, when Snape wasn't breathing down his neck).

Speaking (or thinking) of Hogwarts, Mordecai had completed all the rituals in Slytherin's book that he'd been planning on, and the more than a dozen rituals had had a substantial effect on his appearance: he was now six inches taller than he'd been, his muscles were far better toned and his whole bearing spoke of strength and power beyond that of a normal human. His strength, speed, eyesight and hearing were also greatly improved, though they were nowhere near the levels of, say, a vampire.

The most interesting ritual he had done was the Elemental Transformation, which allowed him to convert magical energy into a specific raw element and project it from his hands (in English, that meant he could shoot lightning from his fingers, since that was his element).

September the first had come, and Mordecai was carrying a trunk he had purchased down the stairs. After paying Tom, who was the barman even in the seventies, Mordecai flooed to platform 9¾, crashed to the ground, and let a very disgruntled Khelavaster slither off his neck. Once he'd picked himself up, Mordecai made his way to the train and got an empty compartment; he hadn't had any trouble finding one, most likely because he'd actually arrived early for once.

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1975

It wasn't long after the train had started that Mordecai heard his compartment door slide open; glancing up from his Transfiguration textbook, he saw all four Marauders on the other side.

After an uncomfortable pause, James Potter's mouth slowly opened, and, speaking as if he didn't believe it was possible, he said, "You've actually used ritual magic." It had been too much to hope that he wouldn't notice the change, especially after Mordecai had told him that rituals affected appearance.

"I'm not the only one," Mordecai said, filling his senses with wind to dampen the emotions he was feeling, "you've used it too."

"I have never used any form of dark magic in my life!" James responded heatedly, his hand twitching as if he wanted to curse Mordecai just for suggesting it. It would fit what Mordecai knew of him at this age.

"Not all rituals are dark magic–the Animagus Transformation, for example." A brief look of surprise and suspicion flickered over James' face before disappearing, only to return full force when Mordecai added, "Oh, yes, I know. Keep quiet and I will too, Prongs, Padfoot, Wormtail."

"You could have heard those names anywhere!"

"You'll notice I didn't include Moony."

"You could have…you're…you're bluffing!" James exclaimed as he seized on an explanation even he knew couldn't be possible.

"Even if I was, you're reactions have told me all if need to know."

All five merely looked at each other for several moments, before James said in the most menacing voice he could manage, "All right, but if I catch you doing anything suspicious…" and then James hurried away as quickly as he could without looking like he had been scared.

When he was alone again, Mordecai let his mental wind vanish from his senses. When it did, he felt the tingling in his eyes become a sting, and moments later he was curled into a ball crying for the first time in twelve years.

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1975

An indeterminate amount of time later, Mordecai awoke to the sound of his compartment door opening. Not wanting to be caught crying, he transfigured a strand of hair that had fallen in front of his face into a sliver of paper towel and made it brush itself across his face until all evidence was removed.

Turning the paper towel back, rolling over and groaning slightly he asked the only thing that came to mind: "Who?"

"Are you new here?" inquired a cultured-sounding voice as Mordecai struggled to focus on the people in front of him, "I am Lucius Malfoy," the voice continued as the corresponding body stretched out a hand.

Still not completely awake, Mordecai sat up and shook the hand, "Mordecai Saunders, I'm joining sixth year."

"Ah," Malfoy said, "have you heard about the houses yet?"

"A little," Mordecai answered, not wanting to reveal his knowledge.

"There's Gryffindor, supposedly for the brave and courageous, but in my experience that usually means hot-headed and reckless. (Mordecai wasn't in a position to argue the point after the Department of Mysteries fiasco.) Hufflepuff, for…_hard workers,"_ Malfoy continued, giving a sneer his future son couldn't hope to compete with, as if hard work was something incredibly revolting, "Ravenclaw, for the intelligent, if a little stuffy. And Slytherin, (Malfoy shifted to make the badge on his robes ever so slightly more prominent) for the cunning and successful."

"Thanks," Mordecai said, "what else can you tell me about the school?"

Malfoy inquired what classes he was taking and told him who the professors were (McGonagall and Flitwik still taught, Potions was taught by Professor Slughorn and Care of Magical creatures by Professor Kettleburn), and that the Defense would be someone new.

"None of the last eighteen Defense teachers have lasted longer than a year and a lot of people are starting to think the job is jinxed. I expect good duelers will get pretty rare when Dumbledore runs out of decent teachers, so it's a good idea to take Defense before that happens."

"Yeah," Mordecai agreed, thinking of Quirrell, Lockhart and Umbridge. Lucius Malfoy was surprisingly pleasant, though Mordecai was sure it was only because he wanted to make allies for his own personal gain. Still, he probably wanted to keep on friendly terms with Malfoy, just in case he was sorted into Slytherin, which was a real possibility.

"Were almost there, so you should get changed," Malfoy said before leaving.

Mordecai did so and got out onto the platform when the train arrived. Finding Hagrid, he asked and was told that he was supposed to go with the first years.

As Mordecai walked down the path, he froze as he felt his mental senses abruptly expand. Almost as soon as he did so they returned to normal.

Making his way forward rather cautiously, unsure of what to make of the new phenomenon, Mordecai noticed nothing unusual until he reached the beach with the boats. As he headed towards one, he felt his senses expand like they had earlier; the mental wind surrounding him and allowing him to sense minds close to him melded into a cloud of fog extending across a ten foot diameter circle ahead of him that revealed not only minds and unshielded thoughts but wands and other magical or enchanted objects.

A thought came through the wall of storm clouds at the center of the fog, _Another legilimens?_

As Mordecai realized that his senses had connected with those of another legilimens, he tried to push a thought through his own comparatively flimsy walls, _No, I'm a really smart flobberworm._

A sensation of chuckling came from the other mind as its corresponding person turned to look at him and Mordecai saw the other legilimens was a shorter boy of about his age, but could tell little other than that in the dark.


	5. Chapter 4: Not Another Two!

A/N: I'm so sorry! Hurricanes of vacation and tornadoes of sloth hit my writing schedule, and now it's under eight feet of excuses and I'm blaming FEMA.

None of you were even CLOSE on the legilimens, now I know what Rowling feels like.

Thoth Father of Magic: You should have known it wasn't Snape, since I already mentioned that this was after the scene in his pensieve, so you know he was already at Hogwarts.

Disclaimer: If you think I'd just post this for free if I owned Harry Potter you probably can't understand this sentence, anyway.

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Chapter 4: Not another two!

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1975

"Saunders, Mordecai," came McGonagall's crisp voice.

Mordecai walked to the stool in front of the teachers' table and sat, as McGonagall dropped the Sorting Hat over his head; this time it didn't cover his whole head, but came down to the bridge of his nose.

_Hmmmm… interesting…_ The hat didn't have anything else to say for several moments, as it sifted through Mordecai's sixteen years of admittedly interesting memories. _Where to put you, where to put you? You have the intellect of a Ravenclaw–_

_Really?_ Mordecai thought in surprise.

_And the humility of a Hufflepuff_–

_Not the duffers!_

_But if I put you there, you might have self-image problems, and those are more common in Slytherin._

_Really?_

_Yes, many of them are either incredibly arrogant or have no confidence at all, but they hide it better than the others._

Mordecai was rather surprised by this revelation; it had never occurred to him that some Slytherins might be under-confident.

_You're also as unobservant as a Gryffindor._

_Get on with it!_ Words couldn't describe annoying it was to have a talking hat tell you you were unobservant and might have hidden self-image problems.

_And as impatient as a Gryffindor._ The hat sounded like it enjoyed annoying people; but it hardly ever got the chance, since most first years were too nervous to be annoyed. Mordecai pictured the wand movement and incantation for a fire charm in his mind to try and get a message across.

_But you're as dark as a _"SLYTHERIN!"

As McGonagall swept the hat off his head and Slytherin applauded, Mordecai couldn't help but think that something very important had just been decided, and that he was the only one who didn't know what it was.

As Mordecai approached the Slytherin table, he saw that it was much fuller than in his time, as were the other tables; apparently the last years of the war had taken quite a toll on the wizarding population. Unfortunately, this also meant that he would have to sit next to either Malfoy or Snape.

Mordecai had just reached the seat next to Malfoy when McGonagall called out the last student's name (the first years had been sorted before Mordecai and the other transfer student).

"Sultzey, James!"

Mordecai glanced up in surprise just in time to see the author of _Dueling with Minds_ take a seat and don the Sorting Hat. A quick look around the hall revealed that only Severus Snape, Remus Lupin and a few older Ravenclaws recognized the name.

"Do you know him?" Malfoy queried.

''No, but I've read one of his books.''

"Books? What has he written?"

''Several books on mind magic, though I've only read one."

At that, Malfoy flopped his head onto his plate and groaned loudly. It was a distinctly un-Malfoyish gesture, the sort that Mordecai might be able to use for blackmail when he got back to the future, if he had a camera.

Apparently the other Slytherins thought so too, as the event had attracted quite a bit of attention, and one even dived for a camera, but Malfoy was back up and looking his aristocratic best before the device made it into the open.

"What's happened, Lucius?" a boy with jet black hair and icy blue eyes asked from across the table.

"Another legilimens! Another _two_ legilimens!"

Everyone within hearing range stared at Malfoy for several long moments, as if hoping he would announce that it was all a big joke. When he didn't, they shifted their gazes to Mordecai, and a moment later began studiously avoiding eye-contact as they edged as far away from him as they could at the crowded table.

''Er…" Mordecai began, feeling like he should say something, "did I do something?"

"Having Snape poking around in our heads and blackmailing half the school is bad enough!" an impeccably groomed black-haired boy who slightly resembled Sirius exclaimed, "we don't want any more of you lot around!"

Malfoy spared a moment to glare at the speaker before taking a more diplomatic approach, "I do not recommend following in his footsteps. He can hardly walk down to breakfast without being cursed by one of the people he has _not_ blackmailed, and none of the fourteen girls he has asked out has said yes." Mordecai was willing to bet the last was a very well-quoted statistic.

Social outcast or not, Mordecai didn't want to be grouped in with Snape on principle, "He looks like his footsteps would be pretty greasy, anyway."

After a bit of nervous chuckling from the Slytherins, the black-haired boy asked, "So you say you're not going to be snooping around inside our heads?''

"No, I won't."

An uncomfortable pause followed and most of the listeners gave him skeptical looks, before the boy with the icy-blue eyes broke the silence, "The hat's taking a long time." It certainly was; James Sultzey had been wearing it for at least five minutes.

As the Sorting Hat sat unmoving the students grew restless and the sound of chatter began to fill the hall. Even Lucius Malfoy was beginning to show some signs of impatience after ten minutes. At long last, the Sorting Hat decided on "SLYTHERIN!"

As Sultzey passed by on his way to the last seat, blue-eyes asked what had taken so long and the legilimens answered, "We were having an interesting philosophical discussion." The Slytherins spent several moments exchanging looks that plainly said 'he's a nut,' and then burst into laughter.

Afterwards, the rest of the Slytherins seemed to open up to Mordecai and he learned that the boy with the blue eyes was Daren Nott and the one that resembled Sirius was Regulus Black. Daren told him that all positions on the Slytherin Quidditch team were open every year, so that they always had the best players in the house; occasionally, a position would change in mid-year if the players thought it would help their odds.

As the feast drew to a close, Dumbledore stood to address the school. "Good evening, and welcome to a new year at Hogwarts. After last years' regrettable incident (here Dumbledore paused to allow the sniggers and chuckles to die down), Professor Barone will be teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts," a heavyset man with pronounced eyebrows and straw-colored hair stood to mild applause. "At the insistence of Auror Crouch, there will be an auror on site at all times to look for suspicious behavior," Dumbledore announced in the tone of voice that said 'It's not my fault and I don't like it either' as a wiry, suspicious looking man with dark eyes that darted in every direction, as if trying to focus on everything at once rose to his feet; as he did so, many students, mostly Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs cheered and applauded wildly, while others, mostly Slytherins and Ravenclaws eyed him suspiciously. Mordecai doubted that that many of the Ravenclaws would be Death Eater sympathizers, but many of them were probably intelligent enough to know what could happen when the Ministry started interfering with things.

As his gaze fell on the Gryffindor table, Mordecai saw James Potter looking fixedly at him while he applauded. No doubt he did not have the foresight of a Ravenclaw.

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1975

"Snivellus," Lucius said, causing a section of inconspicuous stone wall to slide aside, revealing the entrance to the Slytherin common room; Snape was obviously not well-liked.

As Mordecai passed through, following the others to the boys' dormitory, he noted that hardly anything had changed about the room in eighteen years: it was the same long, low, dark stone hall that looked like the part of a movie set that villains would use to plan world domination and laugh evilly.

Mordecai and James Sultzey followed Daren down an unnecessarily long, torch-lit corridor to a door labeled 'sixth-years;' passing through, they emerged into a pentagonal room with a door in each wall.

"The bathroom is through that door," Daren explained, "and the other three doors lead to the dormitories. Antonin and I have that one and Snivelly is in that one, so you'll want to use the one in the middle."

"I suppose rooming with 'Snivelly' isn't an option," James noted with amusement as he walked into the dorm.

"Someone doesn't know how to decorate," Mordecai said as he followed; the room itself was made with dark grey stone, the two beds had dark brown frames and were hung with dark green, and nightstands were quite dark as well and all the colors clashed rather badly. He drew his wand and changed the color of the frames to silver, as James exchanged the hangings for dark velvety green ones that were much more attractive than the originals.

"What classes are you taking?" James asked as he swapped his robes for nightclothes with a flick of his wand.

"Charms, Transfigurations, DADA, Potions and Care of Magical Creatures," Mordecai answered as he got ready for bed the muggle way.

"The same, except charms," James pulled a miniature book out of his pocket and returned it to its proper size.

"I think they forgot to bring in your trunk," Mordecai observed.

"Didn't see a point in bringing one, when I have expansion and feather-light charms on my pockets."

But the misty legilimency field surrounding James didn't show any such charms. 'Looking' closely, Mordecai saw that there were small, nearly invisible distortions in the field that created a large number of blind spots around James' body, no doubt concealing the charms; and, "How do you have charms on your clothes when you just transfigured them?" because transfiguring things broke any spells placed on them.

"A bit of inventiveness," was all James answered before climbing into bed with the book and pulling the curtains shut.

As Mordecai followed suit, he wondered if the mysterious occurrences that were always happening around him couldn't give him a break for a little…


	6. Chapter 5: VERY Practical Defense

A/N: I have had an _extremely_ bad case of writer's block, but am hopefully finished with that for a while. I've also written couple of scenes that happen later and I can't post yet.

Thoth: 'Pete' will be in this fic. Not quite as bloodthirsty, but just as vicious, when necessary.

Disclaimer: Rowling is rich. I am not. This should tell you that Rowling and not me came up with Harry Potter.

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Chapter 5: VERY Practical Defense

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1975

As Professor Barone let the sixth-year Gryffindors and Slytherins into his classroom, everyone was silent, not sure how tolerant he would be; as the teacher took up his position behind his desk and reached for the roll call, the students studied him as a naturalist might a dangerous creature: attempting to take in every detail, while not daring to make a sound lest it take notice of them.

This particular class was rather popular, including all the sixth-year Slytherin boys and most of the girls (which included a surprising number of future Death Eaters), all the Marauders (except Pettigrew), Lily and another two Gryffindor girls Mordecai didn't know. As Mordecai took a seat in front next to James Sultzey and Barone began the roll call, James took out his textbook and alternated between 'grumbling' through their connected legilimency fields about idiots who shouldn't be writing textbooks and 'worrying' about what the class would be like.

_If the mean professor curses you I'll help you to the hospital wing,_ Mordecai 'said' in amusement.

_I can uncurse myself, and you don't know where the hospital wing is._

As Mordecai mentally reprimanded himself, he felt his mental senses connect with another's and saw that Snape had sat near enough to connect with them; the other Slytherins' mental energy took the form of a pool of water, and his mind was fortified with a wall of icebergs. Snape sneered at him and Mordecai could feel it through legilimency even when he turned away; apparently you could send facial expressions as well as words with legilimency, and probably images too.

Mordecai gripped his desk as he felt a force pressing against his shields and steadily breaking them down; icy cold water began slipping through the cracks, reaching freezing tendrils into his mind. Mordecai withdrew his senses and cut off his mind from the others and attempted to prevent another connection from forming by filling his senses with wind, a process simplified by a future Snape as 'clearing your mind.'

The water rippled and tugged at Mordecai's mind, trying to make him take notice; the time traveler was having less and less success at ignoring Snape when he felt tiny ice fragments floating in the water grinding against his mind. As his concentration shattered and Snape reestablished the connection, Mordecai felt the freezing water pouring into his mind, chilling it as thoroughly as a dementor, and an image began to materialize…

Then the waters jerked out of his mind.

Puzzled, Mordecai looked back at Snape, who was sweating profusely and gripping his desk as well; James was looking at the professor, pen in hand to take notes, the picture of oblivious innocence. Sending his senses out again and reassembling his walls (which took a depressingly short time), Mordecai saw that the cloud of fog was exactly as it always was–except that an occasional lightning bolt was crackling inside the storm clouds that fortified James' mind.

_What exactly did you do?_ Mordecai 'asked.'

An image flashed momentarily before his eyes, of Snape's mind lying in a heap of charred and smoking iceberg fragments.

_You burned his icebergs!?_

_Yep._

Mordecai was having difficulty suppressing a laugh when Professor Barone helped him out with that by asking, "Are you paying attention, Saunders, Snape?"

"Yes, professor," both immediately answered.

"Then you can be first, since you're paying such close attention, Mr…?" the professor looked pointedly at Mordecai while gesturing towards the front of the room.

"Saunders," Mordecai managed through his instantly dried mouth. As he moved to the front, wondering what in the name of Merlin he was supposed to do, Mordecai sent a murderous glare at Snape, but in a few moments his embarrassment overtook his anger as he stood in front of everyone else, fruitlessly searching their faces for some clue to what he should do.

Sniggers were just starting and Mordecai had gone ruby red when Barone announced, "I'll start, then," and drew his wand and fired a curse without any more warning than that.

Mordecai jumped out of the way with a cry and whipped out his wand, instinctively casting a banishing charm (which required no incantation and was therefore very quick to cast) that struck Barone full on and propelled him across the room.

_"Expelliarmus! Stupefy! Rictusempra!"_ Mordecai called out, having learned his lesson about not cursing someone when they were down in his fight with Malfoy in second year.

Barone rolled out of the way and was back on his feet in an instant, _"Triala stupefy!"_

Mordecai's eyes widened as three stunners flew from the tip of Barone's wand, spreading out so that it would be nearly impossible to dodge them, so he conjured a sheet of plywood that reflected the stunners only to have it banished into him a moment later.

Mordecai was thrown onto his back with a grunt and as the plywood sailed over him he began to fire retaliatory spells, but a moment later Barone hit him with a disarming spell and his wand sailed into the professor's waiting hand.

Barone vanished the plywood and held Mordecai's wand out to him, saying, "You have excellent reflexes; you could be an excellent dueler if you pay attention to your opponents."

"Err… thanks," Mordecai said a little uncertainly as he took his wand back and returned to his seat, reflecting on the duel; _Let's see… keep your opponent in sight… and practice occlumency…_ Maybe he would be able to get James to help him with the occlumency part.

"Who's next?"

Potter and Black both had their hands in the air faster than Hermione had ever managed. "Mr…?" Barone asked pointing at Potter, who had already jumped out of his seat.

"Potter," the marauder said, practically running to the front.

"One," Barone began, "two, _stupefy!"_

"That's not fair!" Potter shouted, almost forgetting to get out of the way, before furiously counterattacking.

_You know,_ James 'said,' _I'd really like this teacher if I wasn't taking his class._

Barone stepped aside, allowing Potter's first few curses to fly past and then began to fire second-year spells back as quickly as he could. Both dueled like this for several moments until Barone summoned Potter's shoes, causing his feet to fly out from under him.

_"Finite–"_ Potter began, before his back slammed into the floor, knocking the breath from him.

_"Accio wand!"_ Potter's wand flew from his hand.

_"–incantatem!"_ the summoning spell on his wand broke, causing it to skitter to a stop at Barone's feet, and the professor dropped the spell that was still dragging Potter across the floor by his shoes.

"Not bad, but you need to watch out for sneaky tactics."

Groaning, Potter got back to his feet, before collecting his wand and throwing Barone a dirty look.

"Black!" the corresponding marauder announced as he jumped up.

"Ready?" the professor asked when Black reached the front.

"Su-AAAAAAA-" Black cried out as an invisible spell blasted his feet out from under him and he fell face-first with a resounding THUD.

For a moment, Black lay unmoving, before rolling onto his side and moaning loudly; Barone took a cautious step forward, and, as he looked for injury, Mordecai noticed that the Marauders' nose had somehow come through relatively unscathed, though one side of his face looked rather battered and a little bloody. "Nice try," Barone said as he smirked and stepped back to his former position.

Instantly, Black was back on his feet and yelling out incantations so quickly the words slurred together, _"Stupefyrictusempramordalaacciodeskinanimatusconjurus!"_

Barone blocked two curses, ducked a flying desk and sidestepped a massive anvil that had appeared over his head while being hit with a tickling charm and shooting his own spells back.

Black nimbly evaded two streaks of light and was busily transfiguring the chandelier over Barone's head, when a third spell flew past him before curving around and hitting the Marauder in the back. Black stumbled forward, but maintained his balance as he cast a shield charm in anticipation of Barone's next attack.

The shield stopped the professor's summoning charm, but Barone kept on with a relentless barrage of summoning charms, and spells that changed direction or covered a large area so that they could not be dodged. Black, forced to use shields instead of his usual dodging tactics, was immediately put on the defensive, but held out for several minutes before being disarmed.

"Excellent job," Barone commented, "but you need to work on your shields."

"Snape," the corresponding Slytherin sneered as he rose, somehow making his name sound like a terrible insult directed at everyone except himself. Snape glided forward, wand out, trading nasty looks with Black on his way.

"Are you ready?"

_"Protego,"_ Snape enunciated clearly, and a moment later the chandelier Black had been working on earlier exploded, no doubt due to an invisible, silent spell of Barone's that had been reflected by the shield. "Yes, I am ready."

Immediately, both began to duel furiously, and Mordecai was sure he'd never seen half the spells they were using; Snape was mumbling his incantations almost as an afterthought, while Barone kept his mouth firmly shut, except when using a particularly powerful spell. Mordecai couldn't help but feel a grudging respect for Snape's dueling ability, as Barone was now being forced to run around his side of the dueling area in a desperate attempt to get out of the way of Snape's spells, while the latter had not moved an inch since the start of the duel, defending himself entirely with shields.

_"Edangar!"_ Barone called out, causing a deep green, metallic shield with a golden lion emblazoned across it to materialize on his left arm and using it to reflect several curses with a string of deep gonging sounds. Now that Barone could block the vast majority of the spells in Snape's substantial repertoire without taking time to dodge or cast shields, he wasted no time in pounding through Snape's shields and taking his wand.

As Snape took his wand back and returned to his seat, Barone was too out of breath to comment. After the professor had regained his wind, the duels continued, though no one else did as well as Black or Snape, and Mordecai was relieved to see that he had done better than most of the class.

When James Sultzey had started his duel with an incredibly fast-moving bolt of liquid blue light, Barone had been forced to conjure his lion shield again and was nearly thrown off his feet by the impact; James then conjured a similar, deep-golden shield with a winged cat on it that was the exact same kite shape as the one Voldemort had used in the Ministry, rather than the rounded, flat-topped shape of Barone's. James' shield had not visibly recoiled, despite some impressive-looking spell work from the Defense teacher.

But, despite his spell-knowledge and failure to use any magic that looked like it could be done by anyone else in the room, James' dueling abilities were somehow on par with Neville Longbottom's, and he was quickly defeated.

The final duelist, Lily Evans, had just lost her wand and was holding out her hand expectantly; Barone eyed her for a moment, before seemingly coming to a decision, leveling his wand at her, and shouting, "AVADA KEDAVRA!"

–––––––––––––

1996

"Mr. Weasley."

Ron jumped in surprise and looked up from his essay (yes, he was _bored)_ to see the headmaster of Hogwarts standing in the doorway of his room at Grim-mauld place.

"Getting an early start on your summer work?"

"Yes, professor."

Dumbledore sighed, and some of his strength seemed to leave him as he sat on the end of Ron's bed, and spoke again, "I am afraid there are some things I need to discuss with you, about recent events."

"It's not about Voldemort, is it? He's not coming after me, is he?"

"No," Dumbledore reassured him with a kindly smile, "he will be much more concerned with Harry, and with his a now-necessary 'PR' campaign. No, I fear there may be repercussions for what you did at the Department of Mysteries."

"I didn't do anything wrong, did I?"

"Only brave acts of heroism; in better times you and your friends would have been given awards for services to the Ministry and offered scholarships to auror college. But, while Fudge has been removed from power, everyone in the line of succession is one of his appointees, and it takes time to select a new minister."

"But," Ron protested, "they can't do anything! We were fighting Death Eaters!"

"But not until _after_ you broke into a highly secret Ministry facility; if the Minister's office presses charges, they'll have no difficulty getting a conviction, since you are very plainly guilty. But I'm sure one of the next minister's first acts will be to pardon you all and invite you to a very stuffy banquet where he can talk about righting wrongs and demanding justice."

"So I'm not going to have to go to Azkaban?" Ron asked hopefully.

"If I am able to delay your trial until we have a new minister. But I must warn you that you'll likely be spending some time in a holding cell, and maybe even a week or two in Azkaban, but at least they no longer have use of the dementors."

"Okay," Ron said, "I guess that's not too bad, for breaking into the Department of Mysteries, but what about the others? What about Harry?"

"You don't have to worry Harry; I don't think anyone wants to be spat upon by every light wizard they meet for the next year," the headmaster answered with a twinkle in his eye.

_Translation: everyone else is in the same boat, except Harry._ "Are any of the Order members in trouble?"

"Alastor, Mr. Shacklebolt and Miss Tonks are all aurors, retired or otherwise, so they are perfectly fine."

Sirius couldn't be in any legal danger, for obvious reasons, but that still left… "Professor Lupin?"

Dumbledore sighed wearily before answering, "I fear he may be in much the same predicament as yourselves."

That was bad, if you were a werewolf. Ron may have found politics as boring as Professor Binns, but he had grown up in the magical world, and knew how the Ministry worked: mostly through a sordid combination of cronyism, nepotism and money changing hands. This gave the pureblood elite an inordinate amount of power, not to mention Fudge's many years of accumulated anti-werewolf cronies.

"I am afraid I must be going now," the headmaster announced as he got up.

It was not until Dumbledore had left the room that it occurred to Ron that Ginny and mum hadn't been told (evidenced by a lack of shouting). Ron wished he had the headmaster's cunning, but Gryffindor courage would have to do…

–––––––––––––

1975

Mordecai had his wand in his hand before Barone's spell could reach Lily, but too late to save her. Before her body had reached the ground, Mordecai had launched a banishing charm at Barone with all his prodigious magical strength, blasting him into the opposite wall with a satisfying _crunch._

_She can't have died, didn't die_…_ It isn't possible to change the past! What if he had?_

Mordecai ran to the front of the room in a daze and dropped beside Lily, not sure whether to mourn her, or curse Barone or himself; in his arrogance, he had gone into the past, sure it couldn't be changed, despite all the warnings.

Abruptly coming to his senses, Mordecai stood and turned towards Potter, waiting for what he knew would happen next. For several minutes, no one in the room moved a muscle, except to shift their eyes from Lily, to Barone, to Mordecai; then Potter came out of his shock and grabbed his wand, fumbling in his fury, and leveled it at Barone.

_"Cruci–"_

_"Silencio!"_ Mordecai snapped, cutting Potter's spell off.

Mordecai turned back to his mother–and Barone; the latter would have to be revived, interrogated (veritaserum would be nice) and… Mordecai wished wizards had public hangings, or burning at the stake, or crucifixion, or… Whatever it was Mordecai wished wizards had, he knew he didn't want to do it himself, didn't want to feel the anger and guilt he had after cursing Lestrange, no matter how many times he told himself the spell hadn't worked…

"You're in with him on this."

Mordecai jumped at the sound of the rasping, angry voice behind him; he whipped around to find Potter, apparently un-silenced by one of his friends, standing right behind him as he began to yell. "You're protecting him! Get out of my way!"

"I'm not! What are you, blind?" Mordecai protested, gesturing at Barone's crumpled form, now sitting in a disturbingly large pool of blood and complete with limbs projecting at weird angles.

"You're just trying to… to keep anyone from questioning him!"

As Potter tried to dive around Mordecai, the Slytherin seized him and threw him back with little difficulty, due to his ritually enhanced strength.

"James!" Lupin called as he ran forward and held Potter back with his also superior strength.

The noise level in the room then rose rapidly as everyone came to their senses and started talking at once.

"Its all the Slytherins' fault!"

"Shut it, Black!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

"She's still breathing."

"Someone get Dumbledore!"

"I'd like to see _you_ shut me up!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

"Get a grip on yourself!"

"She's still breathing."

"I don't want to be within twenty feet of that old fool! Get Slughorn."

"You're happy about it, you filthy muggle_-_hater!"

"She's still breathing!" James Sultzey yelled at the top of his voice.

Mordecai and Potter were instantly at Lily's side, Mordecai on the pretext of checking her pulse, vaguely hoping that no one would notice that he cared more than a new Slytherin would for a Gryffindor.

_"Enerv–"_ Potter's voice was cut off for the second time that lesson and he looked up, angrily, at James, who had his wand out.

"You have no idea what sort of injuries she may have. Now if you would kindly leave this to us clever Slytherins…" Potter didn't take well to that comment, and was trying to curse James while gesturing for Sirius to remove the silencing charm, when the door opened and Dumbledore stepped in.

As silence descended on the room, the headmaster seemed to know exactly what was going on as he strode toward Barone, drawing a vial of clear liquid from his robes. At first Mordecai thought it was veritaserum, but, when Dumbledore tipped the vial into Barone's mouth and the professor's body began to rearrange itself into a normal-looking position, he began to realize it was phoenix tears.

"She is unharmed, you may wake her up," Dumbledore announced, not even having looked at Lily yet.

_"Enervate!"_ Mordecai snapped, casting the spell before Potter had a chance, just to spite him.

Lily's eyelids opened to reveal confused, startlingly green orbs, before she remembered what had happened and sat up abruptly. "Where's_–_"

"Everything is under control," Dumbledore reassured her, and Lily breathed a sigh of relief as those twinkling blue eyes silently communicated that everything was fine, even humorous. "I warned you that might happen, Randolph."

"Well, yes, but I didn't have time to _blink,"_ Barone protested, "I never even saw who hit me!"

"That would be me," Mordecai informed him smugly, "you should pay more attention to you opponents."

"Before things get any further, I should tell you all that Randolph's_–_Barone's_–_spell was a stunner modified to look and sound like a killing curse, and that he had my permission for this," Dumbledore announced in an impossibly casual tone as he exited.

"Fake… killing… curse?"

"You have the gist of it. And _what_ did you hit me with Mr. Saunders?" Barone asked conversationally.

"A… um, banishing charm, professor," Mordecai mumbled to his professors' left knee.

"Those were impressive reflexes," Barone praised, "much better behavior than sitting in your seat and gaping like a fish would have been."

Now it was everyone else's turn to look guilty.

"Back to your seats!"

"What was that for!" yelped a girl from the Slytherin side just as Mordecai reached his seat.

"If you take your eye off a Death Eater, you'll get a lot worse than a stinging hex," Barone admonished, "in fact, I'd encourage you to shoot spells at each other at random times to keep each other on your toes."

Now, Professor Barone was definitely a cheater, and a bit of a prankster, too, but he certainly knew his stuff: he was an excellent duelist, and his stinging hexes would no doubt teach constant vigilance much better than sneaking up on people and yelling it at them. But telling a roomful of Gryffindors and Slytherins to start hexing each other was the height of stupidity.

–––––––––––––

A/N: So, what do you think should happen to Ron and Lupin? I've pretty much decided about Ron, but I don't have any good ideas for Lupin, yet.


	7. Chapter 6: Our Trusty Ministry Friends

A/N: The Wanderer has returned! And that was a spoiler, too.

The last chapter was updated significantly several months ago, so that the evil cliffhanger is resolved. Sorry if you didn't notice… well, maybe not…

Disclaimer: I am not Rowling. I am a guy. Mistaking me for the owner of the Harry Potter series is just insulting.

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Chapter 6: Our Trusty Ministry Friends

–––––––––––––

1975

Mordecai, James, Daren and the girl who had helped Mordecai with his wand in Knockturn Alley were standing close together dueling with an equal number of Gryffindors; all eight of them were shooting spells, and most of them ricocheted off each other, making them very unpredictable and difficult to aim or block. Snape had claimed a corner in the back of the room and cursed anyone who came near him, Slytherin or Gryffindor. Potter and Black repeatedly tried to get at Snape, but his corner was on the Slytherin side and they were invariably cursed unconscious before they got to him and had to be summoned back and reawoken by Remus. Barone was sitting behind his desk enjoying himself, and no spell seemed to be able to get near him; he had obviously warded the area around his desk beforehand.

James kept trying to curse Barone, and, while his spells seemed to get farther than anyone else's, they never quite made it. He also kept getting stunned while his attention was on the professor.

_Quit worrying about Barone and just curse Gryffindors, _Mordecai 'growled' at James as he reawoke him for the fifth time.

_They just wake each other back up._

_Do you have a better idea?_

_Yes._

A ray of black energy flew toward Barone, slowing as it neared him, and Mordecai might have heard a deep, powerful hum, but he couldn't be sure through the noise of the battle. Surprise and apprehension flickered across the professor's face for a moment before the ray stopped inches from him and exploded into a shower of sparks and he flashed a cheeky grin at James.

Mordecai was getting rather annoyed with James' determination to attack the professor, and he was considering not waking the would-be ward-breaker back up as he fell to the floor again, when a deafening BOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM! echoed through the room. Everyone looked to the source of the explosion to see Barone standing in front of his desk, wand upraised and a plume of smoke rising from it.

"When I said 'shoot spells at each other at random times' I meant ambushes in the corridors and stuff, not a pitched battle, because it doesn't take much vigilance to notice when everyone in the room is dueling. You don't look like you're up to the last fifteen minutes of defense class, so you're free to see Madam Pomphrey now."

–––––––––––––

1996

"Stupid owl," Ron grumbled as he stumbled downstairs, still rubbing sleep from his eyes. Normally, he would be making use of the holiday to sleep in, but Pigwidgeon wouldn't shut up and Ron wasn't going to stay in the same room with the noisy owl.

Ron was a little surprised to find Bill and his father still eating when he made it into the kitchen of Grim-mauld Place; Pig had awoken him _way_ too early.

Tonks was also there, and looked like she'd been up the entire night, as her appearance was even more disorganized than usual; she even looked like she wasn't wearing make-up, but Ron was pretty sure she never wore make-up anyway, so she was probably too tired to use her metamorphmagus abilities.

After responding to several variations of 'good morning' with an indistinct mumble, Ron began piling food onto his plate and asked Tonks what had kept her up so late. She answered with an indistinct mumble and several Weasleys laughed.

The fireplace roared with green flame for a moment before a harried Kingsley Shacklebolt stepped out brandishing a newspaper, "We've got a leak, Tonks!"

"Uh?"

Shacklebolt threw the paper down on the table and everyone except Tonks reached for it; Ginny, being the most starved for information, got to it first. Ron was a close second.

"Dark Lord's spymaster returns to England," she read, "an exclusive contact in the Ministry reveals that auror intelligence has recently confirmed rumors of the return of James Sultzey, reports Kathleen Murdrow.

"Aurors attempted to capture Sultzey last night, only hours after he arrived from America, but were eluded by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's most feared spy. Ministry officials are confident that he will not evade capture long, but Prophet readers will recall the same things were said about Sirius Black.

"Civilians are warned that Sultzey is armed and extremely dangerous. The dark wizard was an unspeakable before being revealed as a follower of You-Know-Who, and may have been a member of the highly secretive Unspeakable Strike Force, a group of phenomenal duelists with access to the Department of Mysteries' most dangerous spells. The Ministry has once again refused to confirm the group's existence…

"And a bunch of other useless stuff," Ginny finished.

"As I remember him from Hogwarts, James couldn't win a duel with a fly without laying several traps beforehand," came the voice of Remus Lupin as he entered, still rubbing sleep from his eyes.

"We all know the Unspeakable Strike Force is rubbish anyway," mum said dismissively.

"He doesn't need to be any good at dueling," Tonks said, "we tried to catch him last night, and we'd spend two or three hours chasing him down only to find out we'd been chasing an illusion or something, and then he'd show up and curse someone with a bizarre hex and we went through it all over again."

_So she _wasn't_ up all night on Order business,_ Ron and Ginny thought at the same time.

Apparently not wanting to get into this discussion in front of the little helpless babies who'd been fighting Death Eaters two weeks ago, his dad changed the conversation, "What did Harry say in the letter you got last night?"

_It really says something about your social life when you get an owl and no one has to ask to know who it's from,_ Ron thought glumly. "You know he can't say anything in a letter," Ron said, letting his temper show through; he was still mad at the Order for making Harry stay with the Dursleys. At least they could write, even if they couldn't write about anything important.

The rest of breakfast continued with Ron and Ginny doing their best not to strangle anyone. With great effort, they succeeded.

–––––––––––––

1975

Auror Dawlish entered a particular third floor corridor, moving toward a particular section of wall, when he heard the door behind him open again; whirling around, his eyes fell on an older Slytherin.

"Shouldn't you be eating lunch?" Dawlish questioned; if there was anything he didn't like, it was people who weren't always exactly where they supposed to be and doing exactly what they were supposed to do.

The student flicked out his wand, silently conjuring a very large and succulent crab leg, minus the exoskeleton. Stuffing his mouth, he managed to say, "Uh am."

"Sultzey, isn't it?" Dawlish sneered, his opinion of eating with your mouth full about on par with his opinion of the boy's attitude. "I suggest you get your nose out of auror business."

The crab leg vanished and Sultzey's mouth cleared instantly, leaving him with such a cold, blank expression that Dawlish thought for a moment he was Crouch undercover with polyjuice, before remembering that Crouch had recently been promoted to head auror and would no longer be doing undercover missions. "I am fully aware of the Open Conspiracy," Sultzey stated with perfect neutrality.

"You are one of us?" Dawlish asked in surprise.

"Hardly. If you attempt anything here, I will kill you."

_Oh, really?_ Dawlish thought; he could kick any student around like a quaffle, and probably wouldn't even need his wand. "Who put you up to this?"

"I don't think she would like to be incriminated."

"You can be arrested for threatening an auror," Dawlish warned, "now tell me who told you to do this."

"I meant 'no,' in case my previous phraseology was too complex for you to understand."

Dawlish decided that Sultzey's attitude could be best cured by a show of force: any student would rapidly be reduced to babbling confessions and pleading ignorance when they realized that aurors weren't professors. As his fingertips touched his wand holster, he felt that his wand was not there; inwardly cursing, he held his hand in position so that Sultzey wouldn't note its absence and threatened, "I don't have time for this. Comply immediately or I will use force."

"I'm ready for a duel, then," Sultzey stepped back and drew out a second wand in a single motion. Dawlish's eyes widened as he realized that he would never be able to close the gap between them before Sultzey could curse him with anything he pleased, and–

"Return my wand IMMEDIATELY!" Dawlish commanded, attempting to compensate for his helplessness by shouting.

"As you wish," Sultzey said, tossing his wand back to him, "but remember, I could steal the life from your body just as easily." Then the clever wizard vanished with a faint _pop!_

Dawlish, knowing that apparition inside Hogwarts wasn't possible, snatched up his wand and sent a massive burst of paint down the corridor, splattering the walls but revealing nothing invisible. If Sultzey had used a disillusionment charm he wouldn't have been able to get out of the way without a tell-tale blur.

_"Accio Sultzey!"_

Nothing. But a clever sneak would not give out his real name, and it wouldn't apply if he was transfigured. Perhaps a small animagus form?

_"Accio animagus!"_

Nothing. Maybe a part demaguise?

_"Accio part demaguise!"_

Still nothing. Crouch needed to hear about this.

–––––––––––––

1975

Mordecai was having a much less interesting lunch in the great hall where he was supposed to be. His lunch was downright dull, in fact, without anyone to talk to; Mordecai didn't know anyone here and everyone else had their friends and conversations... well, except Snape, but there was a reason he didn't have any friends.

Then there were classes, which somehow managed to be boring, complicated and require a great deal of homework, all at once.

And Headmaster Dumbledore, who had stumbled on his way to the head table for lunch. It wasn't much of a stumble, and Mordecai wouldn't have thought anything of it, but Dumbledore _never_ stumbled; maybe he was being a bit hypocritical, he'd always complained when people paid him too much attention and started jumping to conclusions.

All of these were vying for second, after his ongoing battle to not murder anyone; Mordecai thought he should be given some sort of medal for not killing anyone. Granted, none of the people he had grievances against had been murdered in the seventies, so it wasn't actually possible for him to skewer Bellatrix Lestrange–Black–with his fork, but he still thought he should get some sort of award.

Mordecai stuffed the last of his sandwich into his mouth and gathered his bag, wondering how in the name of Merlin he was supposed to be able to conjure snails by his next transfiguration class. It just wasn't fair! It's not like he was Hermione.

Just as Mordecai entered the entrance hall on his way to Care of Magical Creatures, James Sultzey crashed into him and sent both of them sprawling to the floor.

"Sorry... bit distracted..." James mumbled as he picked himself up.

"What's the hurry? You've got plenty of time for Care of Magical Creatures," Mordecai asked.

"Huh? But... it took me twice that long to get here before," James protested, distractedly waving his wand at the contents of Mordecai's bag.

"The staircases and doors move around," Mordecai answered.

"Merlin, makes it impossible to plan your day," on the third try, James succeeded in making Mordecai's stuff pack itself back up.

"Thanks. Is something wrong?"

"Huh? No."

"You seem rather distracted."

"Yeah, first day and all that..." James lifted a small notepad Mordecai hadn't noticed before and began scribbling something with a pen.

They had already made it onto the grounds before Mordecai did a double-take, realizing that a pen in Hogwarts was definitely odd. When James nearly tripped over his own feet, Mordecai began to wonder what was so fascinating about what James was writing on the pad, but decided to respect his privacy.

After about ten seconds of respecting James' privacy, Mordecai's curiosity got the better of him and he craned his neck to peer over James' shoulder. The notepad–_notepad,_ not parchment, Mordecai abruptly noticed–was covered in extremely complex runes, calculations and diagrams.

Mordecai gulped. "We don't have to do that to conjure the snails, do we?"

"No," James reassured him, "this is just a little project of mine."

"You're not doing that for _fun,_ are you?"

"Yes. Would you stop gaping if I pretended to be offended?"

Mordecai shut his mouth, but had no time to come up with a suitable retort before they reached a small paddock behind Hagrid's hut that would be used for the lesson. Apparently, Care of Magical Creatures lessons were still held near Hagrid's hut, even before the half-giant became professor.

"Las' been fed at six this morning," Hagrid's voice came drifting from the other side of his cabin.

"Thanks, Rubeus," an unfamiliar voice answered, and a moment later a pudgy man with a buzz-cut and short, red beard came around the cabin levitating several crates. After introducing himself as Professor Kettleburn, he lectured them about the importance of their N.E.W.T.s and proceeded to teach a rather boring lesson about bowtruckles. Mordecai got the idea that Kettleburn found the topic boring, too, but didn't want an eventful first lesson of the year.

Mordecai spent most the rest of the afternoon trying to conjure snails in the Slytherin common room along with most of the rest of his year.

"I think you're supposed to twist your wand a little before you flick it..." Nott was saying a bit uncertainly.

"No," a girl Mordecai didn't know interrupted, "I think it's more of a snap, like this," she demonstrated, making a rather odd snap-and-flick motion, and was rewarded with an empty snail shell.

Throughout the afternoon, younger students passing by shuddered in fear of the work they would have to do in the future, older students nodded sympathetically before beginning some monumentally difficult task, Snape sneered in derision and James chuckled in amusement.

"If you're so smart, you do it!" yelled an angry and frustrated Bellatrix Black (whom Mordecai had learned was the girl that had helped him with his wand in Knockturn Alley).

James drew his wand and jabbed it forward conjuring a large snail on Black's open book.

"You!" Black shrieked, blasting it away from her as quickly as possible, "I know that's not the wand motion!"

"I improved it a little," James shrugged, as though it was no big deal.

"Show off," half the table muttered under their breaths.

About an hour before dinner, Mordecai finally decided to ask James for help. It just didn't seem right to ask someone other than Hermione to help him, and James would probably think he was stupid, and... Mordecai wasn't going to be conjuring snails by his next transfiguration class without help.

_An Advanced Guide to Transfiguration_ sailed past his ear as Mordecai entered his dorm and he looked up to see James sitting on his bed and glaring at the book.

"Did it bite you or something?" Mordecai asked.

"No, just the usual defects of school textbooks."

"What are those?" Mordecai asked, "Other than being so boring."

"That's exactly it! The idiots who write them always seem to think the best way to teach is to write a great many of the lengthiest, most boring sentences they can–without ever actually saying anything–then reviewing them at the end of each section, the end of each chapter, the end of the book, the beginning of the next book, while scrupulously avoiding any mention of useful information! Oh... did you want anything?"

"Er…" Mordecai fumbled, again wondering what James would think about him needing help, and it was still the first day… _Why do I even care what he thinks?_ "…I needed a little help with the snails."

"Hmmm… how familiar are you with organic conjuring?"

"…"

James seemed to hesitate for a moment, and peered at him as though weighing him. Mordecai thought he felt something prickling at his mental defenses, but couldn't be sure.

A shift in James' demeanor seemed to show that Mordecai had passed whatever test he had just been subjected to, "I assume that you do not know the underlying principles of transfiguration," it wasn't so much a question as a statement that demanded confirmation.

"No," Mordecai admitted, flushing and feeling stupider with every word James spoke.

"I thought not; it is a highly protected Ministry secret in Britain."

Mordecai nearly choked in surprise.

"Are you at all familiar with atoms or the particles that make them up?"

"Um… a little. But that was years ago," Mordecai responded.

"The electrons and quarks that make up atoms are what nearly everything is built from. Most transfigurations are complex arrays of massive numbers of tiny manipulation spells that rearrange matter at the atomic or subatomic level. The only reason such complex magic can be managed by a wizard is that transfiguration spells group smaller manipulation spells together in such ways that nearly all of the work is done without thought by the caster; still, transfigurations are very difficult."

"Er..." Mordecai said, trying to take all that in. "So," he began again, "transfiguration is rearranging subatomic particles?"

"Often. But many times atoms or molecules are left intact, if possible; that's why it's easier to transfigure an object into something similar to itself."

"Conjuring and vanishing?" Mordecai asked.

"No one is entirely sure how, but conjuring and vanishing bring individual particles into and out of existence. Any transfiguration that changes the size of something involves some conjuring or vanishing, which is why transfigurations that do not change an objects' size are easier."

It sort of made sense, if the inevitable headache didn't bother you too much, but Mordecai still had one question: "So how do I conjure snails?"

"Because rearranging so many particles is a far more complex task than any spell could accomplish on its own, transfiguration draws on the caster's understanding of the objects they are transfiguring, so that a detailed understanding of what is being transfigured and the theory of the transfiguration itself is incredibly helpful," James answered. Somehow, he managed to make Mordecai feel stupider than Hermione ever had; it was as if James thought everyone should already understand what he was saying, but he was trying not to embarrass them out of sympathy for the lesser mortals.

Mordecai pushed his feelings aside and determined that he _would_ understand what James told him. After attempting the spell several times while James watched, James would advise him to add a slight left-to-right movement to his wand motion, because wizards with slightly high blood pressure often needed a higher level of transversal manifestation energy, or that he needed to draw his wand in slightly as he brought it down, because yew wands often needed to have their aggressive tendencies curbed when casting creative spells, and what in the name of Merlin was his wand core made of?

By the time they left for supper, Mordecai was able to conjure snails and even control what size they were, though he had trouble making different species. He was also a little in awe of James Sultzey.

James had seen from the way his spells worked that Mordecai's wand had an unusual core and that he had a deep magical bond with another; James also claimed that Mordecai had slightly high blood pressure and a genetic predisposition to skin cancer, though Mordecai was a little suspicious about the last two.

But, even after being lectured about a myriad of complex transfiguration principles he had never even heard of before, Mordecai still had many unanswered questions. Most of these were questions about James himself that Mordecai didn't think would be answered, such as why would James be telling him Ministry secrets less than 24 hours after meeting him.

But he thought it okay to ask "How can you stand to leave your mind senses open?" as they departed the Slytherin common room, "I've got enough thoughts without trying to listen to everyone else's."

"Normally I don't pay much attention to others' thoughts, it's sort of like being in a talkative crowd. I only pay close attention to my own 'conversation,' or thoughts," James answered. "Did we go left or right here? I'm pretty sure we need to turn."

Mordecai realized with a chill that he had completely forgotten how hard the corridors were to navigate. Fortunately, he had never known the dungeons very well, so he hopefully hadn't shown too much knowledge of the castle's layout.

"Do you remember?" James asked again.

"Right, I think. You might have remembered too if you didn't walk around all day with your nose in that notebook."

"It was fascinating!" James defended himself, sounding amazingly like Hermione when she talked about some impossibly difficult subject.

"What was it about, anyway?" Mordecai asked.

"I've been trying to find a way to conjure enchanted objects with enchantments already on them, but I haven't had much success."

"Isn't that impossible?" Mordecai was pretty sure only non-magical objects could be conjured, but he wasn't going to trust his transfiguration knowledge over James'.

"Yes, that's why I'm trying," James answered shooting him a grin.

Mordecai grinned back, understanding completely. Now scribbling complex runes in a notebook all day made sense: James was adventurous, just in an unusual way. "If I want to do the impossible, I usually try in the middle of either a battle or a quidditch match."

"What's the diff–"

"AVADA KEDAVRA," someone yelled behind them.

Mordecai threw out his arm, pushing James to the floor as he drew his wand and whirled to face their attackers. Mordecai's vicious banishing charm flew wide, showering the attackers with chunks of rock from the wall behind.

"TRUCE!" yelled a slightly panicked voice and Mordecai stared in shock as he recognized the marauders looking nervously at his wand and reaching for their own, which were not yet drawn. Potter took a moment to relax before saying flippantly, "Merlin, he's jumpy. Wonder what he'd have done if I had been holding a wand when I said that?"

The marauders grinned weakly, apparently trying to get Mordecai to understand that it was all 'just a prank.'

Mordecai was infuriated.

"What in the name of _Merlin_ makes you think you can start yelling killing curses at people! The _next time_ someone sneaks up on me like that, I am NOT going to stop with banishing charms!" Mordecai paused in his rant to glare at Potter, who he was pretty sure had been the one to yell the killing curse.

While Potter may have been mildly apologetic before Mordecai started ranting, he did not take kindly being yelled at by a Slytherin and exploded, too.

"Like that's any worse than stealing MY LILY!"

Mordecai was flabbergasted for a moment, wondering how an ice cream counted as 'stealing Lily,' but felt obligated to retaliate. "How is she YOUR Lily? If you listen to _her,_ you're hell-bent on ruining her–"

"I'LL NEVER TRUST A SLYTHERIN! I'LL NEVER TRUST A SLYTHERIN ANYWHERE NEAR MY–"

"I DON'T KNOW HERE YOU COME FROM, BUT HERE A GIRL HAS TO _AGREE_ TO BE 'SOMEBODY'S'!"

"WHAT ARE YOU ACCUSING–"

Mordecai smirked at Potter as he saw Remus Lupin aim his wand at him and cast a silencing charm at the incensed marauder, but had no time to wonder why Potter was smirking before his own voice was cut off. Both infuriated wizards rounded on their companions and tried unsuccessfully to yell at them.

"I feel obligated to point out," James addressed Potter, "that yelling the incantations of unforgivable curses may not be the best way to win the heart of a muggle-born prefect."

Potter snarled and drew his wand just as Professor McGonagall rounded the corner, causing everyone to freeze immediately, with varying degrees of guilt on their faces.

"Is there a reason for drawing wands in the corridor?"

"Everything is under control, professor," Lupin said evenly, despite the drawn wand in his hand. His perfectly controlled expression gave the idea that he could have lied convincingly to Dumbledore. "Heated words were exchanged, but James was just about to put his wand away; he hasn't cursed anyone."

"Is that true?" McGonagall asked turning to Mordecai and Sultzey.

"Yes, professor," Sultzey answered, but when McGonagall was not convinced he added, "silencing charms were necessary, but it did not go further than words." The Slytherins' tone was every bit as calm and collected as Remus', and McGonagall seemed satisfied with a stern warning; after all, the only spells cast had been silencing charms, and those in an effort to diffuse the situation.

As soon as the professor had disappeared around the corner, James and Lupin countered the silencing charms they had cast. "My apologies," Potter said to Mordecai, extending his hand, "I should not have surprised you like that, or said what I did."

Mordecai was rather taken aback, but pleasantly surprised at Potter's sudden maturity, and shook the offered hand. As he opened his mouth to accept the apology, Potter spoke again, "Why don't we meet some time and I'll show you some nice hexes?"

Mordecai thought that was rather more than necessary, and became suspicious; it took him several moments to work out that Potter was challenging him to a duel. "I don't think so, but I'd be happy to give you a few pointers on defense."

"We'll see," Potter said, "since you're new, I'll give you three days to select the time, place and your second," and with that, he strode off.

"Don't look at me," James said immediately.

Mordecai sighed as they made their way to the door, wishing again for his friends. He was beginning to seriously question the wisdom of traveling through time alone, and reaffirmed his commitment to try to think things through more before rushing in headlong. Maybe he should have thought for more than a few seconds about accepting a duel with James Potter, whose second would no doubt be Sirius Black, both of whom had made a much better showing in Defense than Mordecai. There was the question of how he was going to get a second, and why was Potter letting him pick the time and place? Was he trying to insult Mordecai, or was it customary? Malfoy hadn't let him choose in first year, but his scheme wouldn't have worked if he had…

Plus, he was far from pleased that he had already gotten himself into a duel with the Marauders on the first day of classes. Most people didn't end up dueling with their parents after every other conversation.

"Fine, I'll be your second."

"Huh?" Mordecai asked, before he processed James' words. "But you just said you wouldn't, and I didn't even ask."

"I have an unhealthy level of curiosity, and am unfamiliar with English dueling customs."

"You sound like Hermione."

"Who?"

"Someone I used to know," Mordecai explained, kicking himself. This fighting with parents business was more distraction than he needed while trying to maintain a completely invented identity. Time for a less risky topic… "So how unhealthy is your curiosity?"

"I entangle myself in an astonishing number of risky magical experiments," James responded in the amused voice used when telling a funny story.

That was when Mordecai decided that Hermione and James were both incredibly intelligent and curious, but that was where the similarities ended. He also decided to tell James about his various fights with dark wizards; a small voice in the back of his head told him that would be giving away too much information, but Mordecai did not think he could succeed in hiding such a large part of who he was, not to mention that, with his unexpected sorting into Slytherin, 'staying under the radar' would likely require at least lip service to Voldemort. "My unhealthy curiosity involves everything from fleeing acromantulae to battling dark wizards out for blood," Mordecai offered as they moved into the great hall.

"You must be much more adventurous than myself," James said, moving toward the nearest seats on the Slytherin table, occupied by a group of third years who immediately jumped up and ran to the other end. It reminded Mordecai of his second year, except that they were fleeing James Sultzey the Terrifying Legilimens rather than Harry Potter the Heir of Slytherin; that, and James seemed to think this perfectly natural as he took his seat.

The only other 'person' Mordecai had ever encountered who was so accustomed to being feared was Voldemort himself; James certainly didn't seem to be anything like Voldemort… but it was enough to make you wonder what Tom Riddle was like at that age.

"I suppose we should prepare for that duel; Potter and Black certainly will," James spoke up, breaking Mordecai from his reverie.

"Yeah," Mordecai agreed as James drew out his pen and notepad and flipped to a blank page, "we should definitely practice some nasty curses…"

"You need to learn some stronger shields, silent spell-casting, better legilimency…" it didn't take James long to fill six inches with what he needed to learn, including such useful dueling skills as arithmancy and astronomy.

"But," James protested, "the position of the stars has a slight effect on the efficacy of many spells–"

"Just how slight is slight, anyway?"

"Up to five percent!"

"That's a fascinating quill you've got," interrupted Lucius Malfoy's smooth voice, "don't you need to refill it?"

"Only once every few days," James answered, waving the ball-point pen for emphasis, "but I put a refilling charm on it."

"Why doesn't it leak?" Malfoy asked. Mordecai was having difficulty repressing a snicker, even though it was a valid question: the reason wizards didn't put refilling charms on their quills was that they would leak, and the spells necessary to only let ink out while writing were generally considered too complex to bother with on quills.

"The tip is shaped so that ink only comes out when it is pressed against something, and it can be retracted so it doesn't touch anything in your pocket," James demonstrated by clicking the pen.

"Ingenious… where did you get it?"

"You can buy them at any muggle department store."

All present only held their composure for a moment, before Malfoy took a step back with a look of utter revulsion and James and Mordecai burst into laughter.

As soon as Malfoy had gone Mordecai wondered aloud whether he would believe the pen was muggle or convince himself James had only been joking.

"Oh, he'll believe me. But whether a ball-point pen with a refilling charm is magical enough for a pureblood to use is something he'll have to decide."

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A/N: Is everyone following the references to James Sultzey and James Potter? Don't suggest changing Sultzey's name, though, I want to make you think...


	8. Chapter 7: The First Challenge

A/N: The reason this chapter took so long was because I couldn't decide where to end it, but the good news is that a good bit of the next chapter is already written. Also, I have put the year at the beginning of each section. To avoid confusing the timelines.

CloudySky: No, Mordecai did not get a magical lobotomy, and he did notice the form of Sultzey's shield. If he hadn't, it wouldn't have been mention because I was writing from his perspective. As to whether you are right about the clues, that would depend on whether the clues you are talking about are the clues I left.

Sentrosi: I DO LIVE!

PSTurner: Where do you get the idea that Sultzey is Potter? There are two James': James Sultzey and James Potter. From now on (READ THIS EVERYONE!) James Potter will be referred to by last name, except in some people's speech, and James Sultzey will be referred to by first name, except in some people's speech.

SaWa-San: Yes, very typical of Mordecai.

Disclaimer: I really should not need to tell you this, but I do not own Harry Potter.

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Chapter 7

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1975

Over the next two weeks, Mordecai improved his transfiguration and potions skills substantially with James Sultzey's help and miraculously kept up with his schoolwork. James' answers, whether to questions in class or on quizzes invariably contradicted the textbooks, but were much better than whatever 'useless babble' (James' words) was the 'correct' answer; most teachers graded him rather harshly, except Slughorn, who caught on quickly and was quite impressed with his theories (but not as impressed as with Snape's).

The Marauders were arrogant pranksters, Barone was a brutal menace in Defense classes, no one tried to recruit Mordecai to join the Death Eaters, Mordecai restrained himself from shouting at Malfoy in the middle of the common room to stop calling people mudbloods, Gryffindors and Slytherins regularly ambushed each other in the corridors at Barone's behest and Mordecai began to fit in with the other students. James did not come anywhere close to fitting in with anybody; he seemed to greatly enjoy performing impossible feats of transfiguration, passing them off as 'nothing, really,' and answering people's question before they asked (courtesy of his legilimency talents), with the result that most students stayed as far from him as they possibly could.

Unfortunately, there was not nearly enough time for preparing for the duel with Potter, planned for Saturday after the third week of classes on top of the Astronomy Tower; James wasn't nearly as concerned as Mordecai would have expected and spent most of the day doing… well, no one had any idea _what_ he did, but he definitely had more free time than anyone else. It was over breakfast two weeks after the start of classes that his free time was explained.

"Merlin, do you have to work on whatever research project that is during _breakfast?"_ Mordecai asked in disbelief as James pushed his plate aside in favor of his ever-present pen and notepad.

"Yes, actually, as this essay is due today."

Mordecai choked on his roll as James began writing at the top of the blank parchment, and Daren asked, "Do you mean that you haven't even started McGonagall's essay? As in, the one due second period today??"

Mordecai suspected that Daren Nott was planning on recruiting James, because he was extremely helpful to the legilimens and never showed any fear of resentment of his abilities. James made a sound that was something like 'hm-hm' and mumbled something about concentration as his pen practically raced across the parchment.

"So what do you think Barone has in store for us?" Mordecai asked.

"I hope to Morgana it's not any worse than he is," Mafalda Hopkirk moaned; somehow Mordecai hadn't been surprised to learn that the annoying Ministry person who kept sending him owls about underage magic was a Slytherin. He also seriously doubted that her wishes would come true, as Barone had proven to be even more vicious–the professor called it 'demanding what you're capable of'–than Moody. The most worrisome part was that he had advised the members of the Gryffindor and Slytherin sixth-year class to 'be prepared' for the next class, but has made no such declaration to any other class.

"Do you think he was being nice and warning us after what he pulled in the first class?" Daren suggested optimistically.

"No, he had to know the warning would get to everyone," Mordecai disagreed, "he either wants to laugh at us while we puzzle it out, has something special planned for our class, or both."

"Any way you look at it, he's got it in for us. Maybe he doesn't like Evans for some reason?"

Which reminded Mordecai he hadn't spoken to his mother since their chance meeting at Fortesque's, he'd have to do that soon…

"No," Mafalda thought, "it must be Potter. Evans only got stunned, but Potter had to watch her get hit by a killing curse look-alike."

The debate continued in ever more paranoid circles as every remotely reasonable theory was exhausted and the discussion turned to the unreasonable; Barone was a Russian spy, Potter was the spy and Barone was a Death Eater sent to stop him, Barone was an unspeakable here to test spells on unsuspecting students, Barone was a Death Eater sent to prepare the way for the glorious triumph the Dark Lord's mighty legions…

"Whatever is going on, keep your wands close to hand and a shield ready," James advised, reentering the discussion as he twisted around to put his essay in his bag.

"You're finished already?!" Daren spluttered as Mordecai grabbed for the essay.

Mordecai's jaw fell open as he saw that James did indeed have fourteen inches on the theory of gas-to-solid transfigurations. But his shock wore off as he noticed… "You're writing's bigger than mine! And that's not how you spell 'inanimate!'"

"The _point,"_ James snapped, taking his essay back, "is that you spent all Sunday afternoon working on yours and I finished mine in fifteen minutes." The wily legilimens then began to stuff pancakes and bacon into his mouth as quickly as possible, no doubt hoping to fortify himself with a full breakfast before the impending Defense class.

"Still," Daren mused, "I can't wait to see what grade you get on that."

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1996

Tom Riddle wondered whether he would ever be free from his prison… he no longer had the power to rescue himself from what had once been a fortress to be proud of. Now, after Harry Potter killed him, his clever plan was an inescapable prison, and his only hope was that someone would rescue him from the dark and silence…

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1975

The sixth-year Slytherins heard voices coming from defense classroom as they approached, indicating that someone had already sprung whatever trap Barone may have placed; they were very glad of this when they heard Sirius Black's voice rise above the others:

"GET ME DOWN FROM HERE OR I SWEAR I'LL TRANSFIGURE YOU'RE ROBE INTO A BRA!"

"In a real defense situation," the voice of Barone lectured calmly, "you would not get down."

The Slytherins snickered as they approached the open door, each muttering a shield charm as they crossed the threshold, as was rapidly becoming habit among the students; a disarming spell ricocheted off Mordecai's shield, striking Sirius Black who–

Barone was by his desk and not casting anything lethal-looking. _Whew!_

The Slytherin sniggers now blossomed into raucous laughter as they saw three Marauders suspended from the ceiling, apparently by the sole of their shoes. It was difficult to tell, because the hems of their robes were also stuck to the ceiling, obscuring their feet; Remus Lupin's robes were several inches short and had had torn around his shoulders to reach the ceiling, Black had been hit by the reflected disarming spell and was swinging and flailing crazily while yelling insults and profanities at Barone and Potter was reaching for one of the Marauders' scattered wands which remained inches from his grasp.

Snape stepped forward and banished the wand away and aimed his own toward Potter. "Weren't you just bragging yesterday that you were quite talented in hez deflection? Perhaps you would like to prove that?" Snape sneered with a look of unholy glee. Potter's eyes widened and he paled slightly.

"I meant with a _wand._ Deflecting spells generally requires a _wand."_ A little color returned to Potter's face as he got some confidence back and continued, "Since I understand you're not the most intelligent fellow, I'm willing to be reasonable and overlook the mistake if you give me my wand."

"Any _competent_ hex deflector would still have his wand, Potter. Two points for every one you block!"

While Mordecai was not on the best of terms with his father at the moment, he still didn't want to stand around and watch Snape curse him to little pieces, so he did the only logical thing: cheer for Snape. "Bravo!" he called clapping loudly, "our dear Severus is learning a new skill today: cursing unarmed people! It's the first step on the road to beating a gnat in a duel, a goal which our illustrious Slytherin may someday–_protego!"_ Mordecai's lightning reflexes saved him from Snape's silent jinx, but Potter was not so lucky as the bolt of red ricocheted into him and he swung crazily, nearly laying flat on his back on the ceiling before falling back down. Snape used Potter swinging toward him as an excuse to hit him with a banishing charm, and Barone chose that exact moment to release the Marauders from the ceiling; Black and Lupin fell to the floor in a tangle of robes and Potter sailed across the room.

Now that the excitement was over, Snape sneered at everyone in turn before taking a seat in the back corner while Mordecai and James made for the other back corner. The moment it became apparent where James was sitting, the less courageous of the class stampeded to the front while those eager to earn a few points sat as close to him as possible; James had a habit of muttering all the answers too quietly for the teachers to hear, so that anyone near enough to him could earn a great many points by repeating what he said with a little volume. Sitting next to James in classes and at meals was probably not the best way to keep a low profile as Mordecai had planned on, but what was he supposed to do? He and James where the only people who didn't already have a great many friends, and half the upper year Slytherins were Death Eaters, a few having chased Mordecai and his friends around the Department of Mysteries last June; it wasn't as if he could spend all his time with Ron and Hermione.

Mordecai shoved his thoughts aside and turned his attention back to the lesson, deciding that losing himself in his thoughts was not worth a stinging hex. It was a good thing too…

"–will be going in teams of two." Mordecai really wished he knew where he would be going, but it probably wasn't anywhere pleasant; the only times he had gone anywhere for defense classes where during some of Lupin's practical lessons and final exam, maybe this was where he had gotten the idea? "I will call each pair and you will leave immediately. You will be able to leave the area at the end of the period, when you reach the center or when you fail, whichever comes first." Everyone else seemed to know what he was talking about, so Mordecai used his legilimency to peer beyond the defenses of his mind, and sent a message to James:

_Did you hear what he was talking about?_

_Yes, _James answered, _We're going into some sort of challenge course. The entrance appeared in that wall a moment ago without you noticing a thing. The exit will supposedly appear the same way._

The slight emphasis on 'supposedly' made Mordecai very nervous.

"Bellatrix Black and James Sultzey," Barone announced to a great many sniggers. James muttered something including the words 'brainless' and 'fashion-obsessed' at the same time as Black yelped 'the mudblood?!'

"Yes," Barone said, plainly enjoying every second of it, "the mudblood."

James scowled and walked over to the door; Black stormed up to Barone's desk and snarled, "I am not pairing with a mudblood! Change the pairs!"

Barone looked back at her with a look that said 'I would say 'no' if I didn't already know you are much too stupid to understand it. Now leave so I can do something important.' Black stared back with a look that said–no, _snarled_–'I would kill you where you stand if you weren't able to throw me around like a quaffle.'

"Are you done ogling the professor, or can we get started?" James snapped at her; Black huffed and they both stormed out through the door.

"Sirius Black and James Potter!"

These two were much more satisfied with the arrangements and high-fived each other and Lupin before strutting out the door. Why in the name of Merlin did Snape have to be right about his father _strutting?_

Just as the door was about to close, Barone grinned like a Cheshire cat before announcing, "Lily Evans and Mordecai Saunders!"

"WHAT?!" Potter exploded, throwing the door back open.

"Hey, mate, it's not like she's paired with Snape," Black attempted to calm him.

"Stay away from her!" Potter demanded, glaring at Mordecai, "and you better not let anything happen to her."

Mordecai considered pointing out that those two would be mutually exclusive for the next ninety minutes, but instead settled on, "Of course not. I'm a sucker for damsels in distress," hoping Potter caught the jibe.

"GET IN HERE AND COVER MY BACK!" Sirius bellowed, and Potter gave Mordecai one last intimidating glare before going back through the door to help Sirius. The entire class broke into nervous whispers and clutched their wands a little more tightly.

"Err… I guess we should go. To the Hospital Wing. I have a headache. I think Lily does too," Mordecai invented hastily.

"Excellent!" Barone chirped, "You can learn defense with distractions."

"Nice try," Lily said the moment the door (the one to the challenge, not to relative safety) closed behind them, "but how did you get in Slytherin if you can't lie any better than that?"

"I dunno," Mordecai answered, having wondered the same thing himself. "Do you think Black and Potter actually saw anything or just made it up? It looks like we were taken to a different place than them, though."

"A different place? What makes you say that?"

"The walls," Mordecai replied, "these are old and cracked, but the section I saw while Potter was so nicely holding the door open was much newer. I suggest we take a good look around before moving anywhere," Mordecai then began to follow his own advice. The area they were standing in was made completely from ancient, crumbling stone, and illuminated by torches in plentiful sconces on the walls; the chamber was massive and elliptical, with a domed ceiling that stretched out of sight, and a very large pit across the middle; the door they had entered through had disappeared and the only other door was on the other side of the pit. On closer inspection, the pit was about thirty feet deep, fifteen feet across and stretched from one side to the other.

"I guess we have to cross it. Just hover each other across?" Lily suggested.

The last time he had been in something like this was in first year, when the challenges had been straightforward and simple, but Mordecai seriously doubted Barone would make it this easy. He would have thought the idea of just staying in the cavern and talking to Lily would have appealed to him, but he suddenly had no idea what he would say. Especially when Potter demanded afterward if they did exactly that. "It can't be that easy…"

"Why not? Maybe it's to build trust or something."

"Well, if one levitates the other across, then we're separated. If we try to levitate each other at the same time, then our wands are tied up and we can't shield."

"Okaaaaay," Lily said, with the air of humoring someone who was just a little paranoid, "we'll do this." She conjured a sheet of plywood and stepped on, inviting Mordecai to do the same; when they were both on, she levitated it and floated it across the pit and set them down on the other side. The moment they touched the ground, the bottom three feet of the wall the entire way around the room crumbled to dust, leaving behind several stout pillars that supported the walls and ceiling and kept them from falling, and a great many gaps.

A mass of black surged through the new spaces and raced across the floor toward them; Lily and Mordecai both cast hover charms on the plywood at the same time and rocketed toward the ceiling. Mordecai released his, and Lily struggled to get the sheet back under control; when she finally succeeded, both were spread-eagled on it, with their fingers clutching the edges.

"Next time, we need handles," Mordecai decided, getting to his hands and knees rather shakily and peering over the edge, now very keenly aware that he could fall off into–"spiders?!"

"Merlin's bloody eyeballs… I'm not going to doubt you again," Lily laughed nervously, "you don't think they'd really hurt us, do you?"

"Knowing Barone, I'm going to say we'd be _almost_ hurt enough for him to go to Azkaban. How do you reckon we're getting through that door?" Much as he would like to spend a morning chatting with his mother on an aerial platform, the spiders were making him a bit nervous.

"Um…" Lily began, levitating them closer to the exit, "well… oh no, that's crazy."

"What's crazy?"

"I'm not saying; you might get ideas," Lily told him and refused to say anything further.

"Okay, here's the plan: you send us flying at the floor in front of the door at the same time as I magically open it, then I clear the spiders away with a blast of fire right before we land and we rush through and close it," Mordecai felt his palms begin to sweat as his breathing quickened. _Pull yourself together! They're only two feet tall!_

"Mordecai!"

"What?"

"That's about what I came up with!" Lily sounded more than a little scared.

"Come on, they're only two feet tall," Mordecai wasn't sure whether he was reassuring Lily or himself, but it vaguely bothered him that they had both come up with the same plan: it might be too obvious. "Have you got a better plan?"

"Maybe we'll just wait here until class ends; someone's sure to get us." Lily apparently had a little too much confidence in Barone

"I'm not floating above that many spiders all morning!"

"And I'm not crash landing in the middle of them!"

"Then I'll go myself!" Mordecai exclaimed, getting ready to conjure his own platform and hoping Lily's Gryffindor courage kicked in.

"No you won't!" Lily sounded like she was starting to panic, which became very apparent as her concentration slipped and their platform dropped several feet before she regained control.

"Apparently we won't either one be floating all afternoon, one way or another."

"Oh no, oh no, I'm not going anywhere near those things…"

"You're going to have to," Mordecai said in frustration. It was one thing to have to deal with a petrified girl, but it was somehow a great deal more annoying when said girl was your mother; Lily was _not_ meeting his expectations.

"I am not!"

Mordecai was beginning to really wish he'd had James show him the elemental shields yesterday, rather than the modified summoning charms; he wasn't completely sure, but Mordecai was willing to bet that the spiders were afraid enough of fire for a fire shield to keep them at bay. He tried asking Lily, but she didn't know the spell, either.

"Can't we open the door from a distance and levitate each other through?"

"Sure," Mordecai allowed his frustration to show through, "leaving the door open that long is a great idea for getting a bunch of those spiders in the other room."

"Well, have you got a better idea?" Lily snapped back.

"Yes, I just told you all about it."

"It's crazy, and we don't even know the fire charm will repel them from the door," she objected.

"Then let's find out. _Incendio!"_ A flame rose from the floor where Mordecai aimed his wand, and several spiders scuttled aside; Mordecai concentrated and the flame rose to several feet and a small circle cleared around it. "Alright, _Gryffindor,_ we're rushing the door!"

Lily nodded nervously, but she didn't seem quite as afraid as before; maybe seeing the spiders running from Mordecai's fire had encouraged her. "Don't worry," Mordecai reassured her, "I'm sure Dumbledore wouldn't allow this if it could get us killed or something;" Mordecai believed his own words, but they wouldn't do a lot of good unless Dumbledore knew what was going on, which he may well not.

Lily nodded again, gulping nervously. "Ready?" Mordecai asked (ordered, more like). "Three–" he could already feel his blood racing in anticipation and fear, even if the spiders were no taller than two feet, "–two–" _eep!_ Was Mordecai's most coherent thought, "–one–" Mordecai was now firmly in the grip of that terrified, exciting feeling that you experience when you _know_ you're doing whatever you're doing, now matter how afraid you are. _Why am I even afraid of two-foot-tall spiders? Why in the name of Merlin am I going to fly into all those spiders? Oh well…_ "NOW!"

Mordecai felt the bottom drop out from beneath him–literally. Lily sent them flying at the floor, Mordecai raised his wand and roared, _"Alohomora! INCENDIO!" _and had just enough time to see the door burst open before the entire area in front of him exploded into flame. Lily screamed and veered them aside as Mordecai cried out in shock and broke his spell; Mordecai slid across the plywood and scrabbled for purchase while it swung crazily away from the door, but Lily swerved back towards it at the last minute and Mordecai kept his hold until they crash-landed and both were thrown into the doorframe; Lily, who landed half in the doorway, dragged Mordecai through and closed the door with an extremely zealous locking charm.

Then they both realized they were standing in a completely dark room, and the only way out was guarded a horde of giant spiders.


End file.
